Sermon from September 17, 2000
What pictures come to mind when you think of God? Nothing in your life matters more than that. No one better than Jesus Christ can draw those pictures in our minds. He once said, "Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father." As a result, we do not read the Gospels and I am not preaching on the Gospel of Mark in order to take some nostalgic trip down memory lane.

Matthew, Mark, Luke and John present to us the only authoritative and trustworthy accounts of the life of Jesus Christ avaliable to humanity, and as we read, mark, learn and inwardly digest them, we come to see the face of the invisible God.

Having come a quarter of the way through the Gospel of Mark, it is appropriate that we should pause and ask ourselves what image of God is taking shape in our souls as a result of this exposure. The image will not be as clear as we would like, because the surface of our souls on which it is reflected is less like a mirror, which reflects faithfully, and more like water, whose reflections can easily be troubled by any motion at all. We need God's help to be as calm as possible.

My task is to present as faithfully as I can the vision of God that Mark shapes in our souls by the story of Jesus He has told so far. I began last week and am proceeding in the following manner. I have organized what I have to say around seven statements that try to get words around the revelation of God in Jesus' words and deeds. In each case I make the statement and then seek to connect it closely with what we have read together thus far in Mark's Gospel. Finally, I comment on why that statement has meaning for our lives. I made two of the seven statements last week. The other five wait us today.

The first statement I made last week said this. God is acting within human life so as to bless all the nations of earth with unimaginable goodness, and nothing can thwart Him in His purpose. God is acting within human life so as to bless all the nations of earth with unimaginable goodness, and nothing can thwart Him in His purpose. God's ultimate purpose will take the form of a kingdom.

The kingdom of God refers to God's exercise of loving authority over ever increasing circles of human life. That is where these indelible images of Jesus come to mind: His hand on the leper's flesh to heal him; stooping over the paralytic to forgive his sins; dining with the down-and-out in Galilee to show them that they had worth before God; by a word reintegrating the disintegrated personalities of the demon-possessed. That anticipates how the world will be brought under the governance of God without opposition.

This brings me to my second statement from last week. God elected Israel as the human community in which He would anticipate and guarantee the unimaginable good He has in store for all the nations of the earth. God elected Israel as the human community in which He would anticipate and guarantee the unimaginable good He has in store for all the nations of the earth.

To begin with God's ultimate purpose for mankind appears to be worked out specifically within the life of the Jewish people. Look, for example, at Mark 1:2: It is written in Isaiah the prophet ... and the beginning of verse four finishes the thought: And so John came. Clearly, Christianity saw its origins within the life of Israel. The Old Testament prophets anticipated uncannily the life of Jesus Christ.

Furthermore, the Gospel of Mark takes place exclusively in a Jewish setting. The River Jordan, Nazareth, Capernaum, the Sea of Galilee, the synagogues, Jerusalem – all are Jewish places. Andrew, Simon, James, John, Matthew, Nathaniel, Judas, Jesus – all are Jewish names.

But supremely, God's choice of Israel as the instrument for achieving His ultimate purpose for mankind centers on Jesus Christ. Jesus was a Jew – reared in a Jewish carpenter's household, of a Jewish mother, and with siblings who played and worked in the Jewish village of Nazareth. He had a profound grasp of Jewish scriptures and Jewish traditions. Jewish authorities found Him a threat to their national interests. All His disciples were Jews. Jesus reflected awareness of His unique place within the chosen people when He preached, "The time is fulfilled." Jesus saw His life as the climactic moment for which God had brought Israel into existence. He is not only thoroughly Jewish, He is the supreme Jew.

We are now ready for our third statement of what God is like as seen in Jesus Christ. God is compassionate toward human beings in their many sufferings, and He has power to relieve their suffering and bring about the unimaginable good He has in store for all the nations of the earth. God is compassionate toward human beings in their many sufferings, and He has power to relieve their suffering and bring about the unimaginable good He has in store for all the nations of the earth.

We often hear people say, "God is love." How do they know that? How do we know it is not just wishful thinking on their part to say God is love? What hard evidence outside their own heads can they give to support such a statement? We Christians start from a place outside our own devices and desires.

We start with Jesus as the Gospels portray Him. Based on what they tell us, we say that His words and deeds are the garment in which the invisible God comes within reach of human sense and sensibilities. When we consider His words and deeds, we find convincing evidence that the God whom we cannot see is love, and the evidence gives real content to that slippery word love.

God is love in that He is compassionate toward human beings in their many sufferings, and He has power to relieve their suffering. Jesus shows this in many ways in the first four chapters of Mark. For two examples, look at Mark 1:29-31 and Mark 1:41. In the first case Jesus learned that Simon's mother-in-law had the disease of a moment – a fever. He took her by the hand (a tender gesture) and healed her. In the second case a leper (with the disease of a lifetime) comes to Jesus. Verse 41 expresses His compassion. Filled with compassion, Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. "I am willing," he said. "Be clean!"

If by watching Jesus we see what God is like, then we have good cause to say that God is tender, compassionate and powerful toward us. It means more to us than we can say to know that the God who made us is not aloof from our sufferings. We don't want God caught in the same trap we are in, but we do want Him to care about us when the terrible distresses of this world overtake us and threaten to overwhelm us.

The writer of Hebrews saw it this way, when he wrote in Hebrews 4:15-16: For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses ... Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. The help of course does not always take away the distress; it may only help us endure it. Even in the Gospels dramatic help was selective, and that brings me to a fourth statement about God.

God's present exercise of compassionate power to relieve human suffering is selective, because in the kingdom of God matters of the human spirit are more urgent than the relief of suffering. God's present exercise of compassionate power to relieve human suffering is selective, because in the kingdom of God matters of the human spirit are more urgent than the relief of suffering. Look first at Mark 1:35-39. The morning after an evening of healing for the people of Capernaum, Jesus arose early and went out alone to pray.

Verses 36-37 continue. Simon and his companions went to look for him, and when they found him, they exclaimed: "Everyone is looking for you!" I think we can understand their eagerness. "Jesus, you said you would make us fishers of men. Well, we have a net full of them back at my house. Whatever you are doing out here at this time of day, don't you think it is time to come back and finish what you started last night?"

Jesus replied, "Let us go somewhere else – to the nearby villages – so I can preach there also. That is why I have come." Those last six words speak eloquently of Jesus' intention. "That is why I have come." The Man knew what He was about. He was not acting randomly; He was acting according to some clear vision of where He was to go next and what He was to do. Capernaum mattered. Other places mattered also.

In the meantime the sick in Capernaum would get well in the normal course of things or they would not. What He had done was truly compassionate and powerful, but it served a purpose larger than health. It is almost an insult to say that. What could be more important than health? It feels good to feel good. Medical progress is desirable. Health insurance for everyone makes good sense. We are glad the Centers for Disease Control are on the job. "If you have your health, you have everything."

That is a very appealing philosophy of life. Under its impact we are prone to ask, "If God has compassion on human suffering and has the power to relieve the suffering, why doesn't He just do it?" In his delightful fairy tale called The Magician's Nephew, C.S. Lewis pointed out that unwearying strength and endless days are not enough. He said, "Length of days with an evil heart is only length of misery," (p. 157). Before we believe that health is everything, we had better look at Jesus' response in Mark 2:8-12.

He points to a purpose in His healing greater than the healing itself. Verse 9 gives Jesus' pivotal statement. "But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins ..." He said to the paralytic, "I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home." Jesus meant for His power to heal to give powerful, material evidence of His authority to forgive sins. In His mind the power to heal served the larger purpose of vindicating the claim to forgive sins.

The next episode in Mark 2 expands this larger purpose in an unexpected direction. Jesus called Matthew, whom Mark called Levi, to be one of His disciples. Tax collectors were right down there with prostitutes, the demon-possessed, and other "sinners" in first-century Jewish society. These categories of outcasts were used in common Jewish parlance to label someone who was "no better than a pagan" (Jesus and the Victory of God, 264).

One thing led to another, and Jesus found Himself and His disciples sharing meals with other "sinners" and tax collectors, and also found Himself on the receiving end of harsh criticism. When Jesus sat down to dine with tax collectors and sinners, He was defying what pious Jews saw as an indispensable badge of faithful and loyal Jews and also as a protection of the identity of Israel. He was aiding and abetting Israel's greatest enemy. It was unconscionable, and no one who cared about Israel's glorious past and unique relationship with God among all the nations of the world would overlook it.

Jesus called this into question. "It is not the healthy who need a doctor," He said, "but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners." He said in effect, "I came to call the very people you shun." The word call carries its own punch. He did not say, "I came to socialize with sinners," or "I came to be friends with sinners." He said, "I came to call them." "I came to draw into the kingdom of God the very people that you are in such a hurry to leave out of the kingdom of God." God's larger purpose called for the restoration of sinners to full participation in the community of those who were waiting for the kingdom of God.

That brings me to my fifth statement about God. Every alternative to the kingdom of God stands under the judgment of God. Every alternative to the kingdom of God stands under the judgment of God. This possibility means that some cherished, human ways will be found wanting and need to be replaced or at least modified. It also means that cherished human ways that are unwilling to accept God's alternative are subject to removal altogether.

When Jesus said, "Repent," He meant that the kingdom of God will look like nothing we have ever seen before. That is why we have to change our minds (repent) about what we think is best for human life and to believe the good news that God has a better idea. For people to change their minds and believe that will sooner or later have major repercussions in their attitudes, decisions and motivation. Refusing to change our minds also has repercussions.

When the Jerusalem delegation atttributed Jesus' power to the devil, He warned them that they were not only not thinking straight, but they were also in danger of committing the unpardonable sin. Far from being Satan's servant, He was Satan's superior. He responded to His family's statement that He was mentally unbalanced by saying that those who believe in Him do the will of God, and doing the will of God forms a family of faith that transcends the family of flesh and blood. Were the authorities right, or was Jesus right?

In that atmosphere of decision Jesus told the parable of the soils. Anyone hearing that parable for the first time would know every word He said and have no idea what He meant. He explained why He spoke in parables in the first place. He told them, "...to those on the outside everything is said in parables so that, 'they may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!'"

Isaiah 6:9-10, which Jesus quoted, warned of judgment to come on the nation of Israel. To reject Jesus, as some official Jewish leadership had done, would also bring judgment on the Israel of Jesus' generation. Jesus' unintelligible parables symbolized the divine judgment that was coming on people, who no longer had the power to discern what God was doing in Israel.

Israel, His elect people, was in danger of creating an alternative to the kingdom of God. That kind of thing had happened before in Israel's history, and prophets of old had warned them of judgment to come. The greatest of Israel's prophets, Jesus, warned again. If God does not exempt His elect people from judgment, how much more will He not exempt the other nations of the earth. He will not exempt our own.

There is a wideness in God's mercy toward the nations of the earth. He allows them great latitude in developing their national lives with all their inherent contradictions. As those inherent contradictions emerge, God calls on them to repent. If a nation does not, then it takes another step in forging an alternative to the kingdom of God. The more it does that, the nearer it comes to its doom.

As a representative of Jesus Christ by virtue of my ordination, I am empowered to say to all within the sound of my voice: God offers to forgive all your sins and blasphemies by virtue of the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ. By accepting His offer you become part of the process by which God is restoring humanity to what humanity should be. Receiving His offer has an inside and an outside expression.

The inside expression is to agree with God that you have sinned against Him and against your fellow man, and then to accept by faith His forgiveness, which He offers through Jesus Christ. The outside expression is to declare your faith in Christian baptism and in uniting with the visible Church. In a moment I will give you help in expressing yourself both ways. First, however, we should hear one more truth about our God.

At this point it is appropriate to call again to mind the five statements I have made, which build a path from our hearts and minds into the heart and mind of God. Hear them one more time.

God is acting within human life so as to bless all the nations of earth with unimaginable goodness, and nothing can thwart Him in His purpose.

God elected Israel as the human community in which He would anticipate and guarantee the unimaginable good He has in store for all the nations of the earth.

God is compassionate toward human beings in their many sufferings, and He has power to relieve their suffring and bring about the unimaginable good He has in store for all the nations of the earth.

God's present exercise of compassionate power to relieve human suffering is selective, because in the kingdom of God matters of the human spirit are more urgent than the relief of suffering.

Ever alternative to the kingdom of God stands under the judgment of God.