On this date a guest preacher preached
at Victory of the Lamb.
Please enjoy this sermon in the absence
of the one that was preached.
Jesus Cares Enough
Mark 1:29-39
29 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
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
310-217-7638.
A while back if you had called that number you would have received a message of
rejection and ridicule. It was a hotline number set up by an enterprising young
man for single women to use when they are asked for their phone number but
really don’t want to give it out. Of course, they don’t want to be rude,
either, so they give the interested guy this number. When he calls the number
the next day ready to set up a hot date he gets the cold shoulder. A taped
message says, “The person who gave you this number obviously did not want you
to have her real number. Maybe you’re just not this person’s type … This could
mean short, fat, ugly, dumb, annoying, arrogant, or just a general loser. Maybe
you just give off that creepy, overbearing, psycho-stalker vibe. Maybe you
suffer from bad breath, body odor or even both.”
Ouch.
Rejection like that hurts. Especially when you think that the other
person is as interested as you are. Perhaps you’ve experienced something
similar when you’ve been interested in God’s help, and you feel it’s quite safe
to assume that he’s interested in helping, but then – pow! – you get flat out rejected. It’s like God left you
alone when you needed him the most, right? But that can’t be true. God promises
that he’ll never leave us. So if God doesn’t leave us then why does it sometimes
seem like he’s not every interested in us and our troubles? The Gospel for
today helps us better understand
our God by bringing us along to spend a day with Jesus. Whether he is
responding to someone in need by performing a miracle or whether he is refusing
to perform a miracle for someone who asks, in both cases Jesus Cares Enough. So
look and listen, and the next time you feel like you’re being rejected, you can
be certain that Jesus Cares Enough
for you, too.
Even
the most devoted Christians are not immune to the troubles in this world that
sin has brought along as an ugly shadow. That’s not to say that every trouble
experienced by every person is a direct punishment for sin – not at all.
Rather, the troubles and tragedies, the suffering and sickness in this world
are an effect of sin’s general presence ruining our world. But with a God who
wants to be at peace with people, these hardships are intended to be more than
a curse. God wants the effects of sin in the world to help be a cure. God wants
a world gasping in shock at the space shuttle tragedy to face the reality that
human accomplishment is never perfect, to hurt from the loss of heroes, and to
understand that our last breath might be tomorrow – so that we seek eternal
comfort and perfect peace from beyond this world in his heavenly love.
From
God’s perspective, then, pain for believers doesn’t mean he’s rejecting us.
Pain means he’s getting our attention and calling us closer. Like when the “low
fuel” light on your car’s dashboard blinks at you in its ominous orange and
your heart momentarily skips a beat. There’s a problem. And your car
manufacturer is hoping that the blinking light will get your attention so that
you can do something about the problem before it’s too late. For the same
reason, God allowed Job to suffer and God allows you to suffer troubles and
tragedies. God cares enough so that sometimes he says “yes” to pain and
problems that ruin your day. That’s what happened to Simon Peter’s mother-in-law
in today’s Gospel.
Jesus
and his four new disciple recruits needed a place to rest so they headed to
Simon Peter’s home, only to find out that his mother-in-law was quite sick.
Since Peter and the other disciples had just seen Jesus drive out an evil spirit,
and before that they had been out in their boats hauling in the miraculous
catch of fish, it seemed like a good idea to tell Jesus about the sick woman
and see if he’d help her. And he did. “He
went to her, took her by the hand and helped her up. The fever left her and she
began to wait on them.” Jesus Cares Enough to say, “Yes.”
But Jesus doesn’t always say,
“Yes.” Some cancers are cured and others kill. Some troubles go away and others
stay and cause problems. Some prayers are answered just as they are asked and
others are answered (all prayers, after all are answered) with a
cold-shouldered, “No.” We have two such opposite examples in today’s Gospel.
After Jesus healed Peter’s mother-in-law, “the
people brought to Jesus all the sick and demon-possessed … and Jesus healed
many who had various diseases. He also drove out many demons.” Jesus said,
“Yes,” to all these sick and demon-possessed people who could find no other
cure, and he healed them. But the next morning, when the disciples find Jesus
off by himself praying and more people are waiting at Peter’s house to be
healed, Jesus says, “No.”
“Simon and his companions went to look for
him, and when they found him, they exclaimed, ‘Everyone is looking for you!’ Jesus
replied, ‘Let us go somewhere else – to the nearby villages – so I can preach
there also. That is why I have come.’” That, my friends, is a “no.” “No” to the little 4-year-old girl with epilepsy.
“No” to the wife and mother suffering from
migraines. “No” to the man possessed by a demon. All waiting for
Jesus to heal them like he had healed the others, but he says, “No.”
Can
this be the same caring Jesus who compassionately took Peter’s mother-in-law by
the hand? The same caring Jesus who, with the parable of the Good Samaritan,
would later scold the Pharisees for not loving their neighbors like themselves?
The same caring Jesus who would soon promise, “Ask and it will be given to you”? (Matthew 7:7). Is this not
rejection? Is this not what you and I have experienced when we have placed our
hopes, our concerns, our dreams, our problems at the feet of the one we trust
the most, our own Savior Jesus, with the full confidence that he will hear us
and help us and we wait … and wait … and wait … as things don’t get better but
get worse?! Try convincing someone suffering from depression today because
twenty years ago his father died at an early age that Jesus cares! Try
convincing someone struggling with addictive behavior forced to look at that
guilty face in the mirror every day that Jesus cares! Try convincing me, when
my prayers and petitions sound like they are echoing around in emptiness, that
Jesus cares!
We
can not and will not be convinced – at least with the facts, the circumstances.
And therein lies our problem.
There’s more to life than fact. There’s faith. Not a blind faith, either, that
is just supposed to smile and pretend that everything is okay just because the
church says so. But a faith that sees what only faith can say. A faith that reaches beyond the present
circumstances and grabs hold of something solid, something spiritual.
Let me show you something to grab hold of in Jesus’ own words explaining why he
can say, “No,” and still be a caring Savior. When he’s out by himself praying
and his disciples find him, hoping he can come back to Peter’s house and heal
more people, he says, “Let us go
somewhere else – to the nearby villages – so I can preach there also. That
is why I have come.” Jesus came not to heal, not to do miracles, but to
preach, to announce the good news of God’s saving love and forgiveness to any
sinner, even the worst. People with epilepsy can hear that, and someone with migraines, and a
demon-possessed man. Jesus had already preached to these people and that was
enough. Furthermore, Jesus, in his infinite wisdom and love, will never let me
continue to suffer trouble without giving me the help I need for the trouble to
strengthen my soul. As a matter of fact, there is the possibility that if I
were relieved of a particular problem then I might forget about needing God
altogether. So sometimes, when I ask to be rescued from a problem or granted a
dream, Jesus Cares Enough
to say, “No.”
The
apostle Paul experienced this and explains, “There
was given me a thorn in my flesh (some painful trouble) … to torment me. Three times I pleaded with
the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient
for you, for my power is made perfect in your weakness’” (2 Corinthians 12:7-9).
God’s
grace is enough for us. It’s all we need. And it’s plenty. God’s grace is the
air that we breathe to keep us alive in Christ’s forgiveness and at peace with
God. Take God’s grace away while solving all of our other problems in life and
we might be happy on the outside but we’d be empty on the inside, apart from
God’s blessings both now and forever. Jesus Cares Enough to make God’s grace for us the reason
why he came, the reason why he died and rose for us, and the reason why he does
what he does in our lives. Sometimes, that means letting us experience pain and
difficulty so that we stay close to him. Sometimes, that means saying, “No.”
Like a parent saying “no” to a child or a doctor saying “no” to a patient.
So,
today we learn from God’s Word that when it comes to miracles Jesus simply has
a different set of priorities than most of his followers. We want to see
dramatic displays of supernatural upheavals, and we want to be awed by the
touch of heaven’s power in our day-to-day world. Jesus is happy to do that, and
sometimes still does, but he is always guided by a higher purpose for answering
our prayers and granting our dreams: does it bring us closer to heaven or sink
us more deeply into this sinful world? Whether he says, “Yes,” or he says,
“No,” Jesus Cares Enough. Because he cares mostly that we hear about,
believe in, and live under his love. Jesus is a lover of my physical well being
and emotional health; but more importantly and eternally, Jesus is lover of my
soul.
Don’t ever be afraid to ask
Jesus for help, to submit your suggested plan, or to pray for a miracle. But
when you do, believe that Jesus Cares Enough to respond, in his perfect wisdom and
love, with an answer that does you the most good. Jesus Cares Enough to not spoil you, but to save you
forever, and strengthen you for tomorrow. Amen.