So we are in a series in the Gospel of Mark…
- Which is Mark’s biography of Jesus, written around 70AD… and it is his attempt at capturing the story of Jesus life…
- And we have already seen the way he leans on all of the stories and promises of the Old Testament to identify Jesus as the one they all pointed to…
- And the purpose of this biography is persuading us all that this Jesus is the Messiah.
- Central question… Mark 8:29 where Jesus asks his disciples “who do you say I am?”
- So we started four weeks ago with verse 1, where Mark tells us “this is the beginning of the good news of Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God.”
- And then last few weeks, we’ve looked at Jesus baptism, his temptation, and the announcement of the Kingdom
(before we get to passage) Stuff on the Kingdom of God – Derek was great.
- Gordon Fee class…. What was Jesus main message? Love… die for your sins… but actually it is the announcement and demonstration of the Kingdom of God breaking in.
- Announced (time has come), demonstrated (4 ways – teaching, miracles, casting out evil, mercy), released…
- In Acts this proclamation and demonstration of the Kingdom continues… Acts 19:8 “Paul entered the synagogue and spoke boldly there for three months, arguing persuasively about the kingdom of God.”
So we need to frame our understanding of Jesus and our faith around the Kingdom breaking in…
- Now and not yet (Fredrick Buechner – here and there, now and then)
- We are to pursue: Lord’s prayer
- Taking ground… and giving of authority…
So we come to our next passage and it is the first part of a day in the life of Jesus…
- Announced Kingdom, time has come…
- Called some followers…
- Then you get a day in the life of the ministry of Jesus… so the action in one sense kicks off…
- What are we going to see? Committee meetings? An interfaith dialogue? A building project?
- No – we are going to see the Kingdom advance – and it is going to happen primarily in someone’s life!
Mark 1:21-28
21 They went to Capernaum, and when the Sabbath came, Jesus went into the synagogue and began to teach. 22 The people were amazed at his teaching, because he taught them as one who had authority, not as the teachers of the law. 23 Just then a man in their synagogue who was possessed by an impure spirit cried out, 24 “What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”
25 “Be quiet!” said Jesus sternly. “Come out of him!” 26 The impure spirit shook the man violently and came out of him with a shriek.
27 The people were all so amazed that they asked each other, “What is this? A new teaching—and with authority! He even gives orders to impure spirits and they obey him.” 28 News about him spread quickly over the whole region of Galilee.
What do you notice? What sticks out to you?
- Teaching with authority… maybe?
- The casting out of an impure spirit with authority… maybe? Probably…
- News spreads…
So I feel like this is Mark saying… Jesus has announced the kingdom… now watch what that Kingdom breaking in looks like up close and personal in ordinary life…
So with the very guys that Jesus has just called to follow him…
- They went to Capernaum, and when the Sabbath came, Jesus went into the synagogue and began to teach.
- So Jesus grew up, as you know, a few miles to the southwest in Nazareth.
- But think of Capernaum as Jesus’ home, or at least Jesus’ home base, for his few short years in the public eye.
- He probably used Peter’s house as a kind of headquarters, or ground central for Jesus’ kingdom work.
Now, this story takes place on the Sabbath, which is the Jewish day for rest and worship from Friday evening to Saturday evening
- And this story takes place in the synagogue, which was the center point of Jewish life.
- It was where children were educated and then the entire village would come together on the Sabbath for a service.
- And they weren’t unlike our services… full of prayers, reading from the scripture, a sermon and a closing blessing.
- But it was very teaching focused and visiting rabbi’s or priests would do this…
- And guess what Jesus does… he begins to teach!
- And it says the people were amazed at his teachings…
It reminds me of the little old lady who came up to her Pastor…
- She commended him on his sermon…
- And with a bit of false humility the Pastor said… “oh it wasn’t me… it was all God”
- To which she replied “Pastor… it wasn’t that good!”
Well as we have been learning, when Jesus taught… it was all God…
- And the people are amazed at his teaching because he taught them as one who had authority.
- And in a bit of a dig at the teachers of the law, Mark says “Jesus taught them as one who had authority, not as the teachers of the law” Ouch…
- Anyhow, the custom was to teach from the Torah which was the first 5 books of the bible…
And so where as other Rabbi’s would quote other teachers of the law…
- Jesus just teaches… and that was unheard of…
- Now Mark doesn’t include a lot of the teaching of Jesus… if you want that, Matthew and Luke have extended sermons from Jesus…
- The most famous being the sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7.
- And that is sometimes called the ethics of the Kingdom
- Remember he says things like “you have heard it said, but I say to you.”
So if you want to compliment your reading of Mark, take some time to read the teachings….
- It takes about 15 minutes to read the Sermon on the Mount out loud and it is the most profound teaching the world has ever heard.
- By the way I heard the best thing this week… if you want to hear the voice of God, read the bible!
- And if you want to hear the audible voice of God… read it out loud!
- OK, well I thought that was funny!
So back to the teachings of Jesus… the sermon on the mount…
- And just like it says here in Mark, at the end of Jesus teaching it says this….
- “When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching because he taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law.”
- There is that dig again… ouch!
- But this guy speaks and people are amazed… oh to have been there to have heard him!
- But thank God the gospel writers collected so much of it for us!
Anyhow, the Greek word for authority is exousia. And that is going to become really important in answering the question “who do you say I am?”
- Because if we are going to come to the conclusion that Jesus is the Messiah… it will be because we see and believe he has the authority to that title…
- OK, so exousia is where we get our word author. Or originator.
- In fact in the Book of Acts, Jesus is called the author of life… the exousia of life…
- Right, his teaching isn’t borrowed… this comes from the author of life…
- This is God teaching us. This is the author teaching with authority…
- And just as an aside, this is why you want to align your life with Jesus teaching… because it carries the authority to lead you into LIFE!
OK, so as he is teaching… now look what happens… the one who announces the Kingdom of God as having come near is speaking…
- No doubt the people are leaning in… listening like they have never before!
- The one who brings the Kingdom of light is present… he is taking ground…
- And verse 23, just then… a man in their synagogue who was possessed by an impure spirit cried out…
- “what do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.”
- The impure spirit, which is another way of saying a demon, is scared to death of Jesus, and for good reason.
- Jesus is encroaching on his turf.
- If the kingdom of light is taking ground, then the kingdom of darkness and its hold on people’s lives is going to be threatened.
Now if you’re an atheist or a humanist who doesn’t believe in a spiritual world, you may struggle with this story.
- But the scriptures and my experience tells me that the spiritual world is real and there are spiritual forces for bad and the Holy Spirit for good!
- Paul will write in Ephesians… (6:12)
- “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”
- And what we believe is that spirits or demons can attach themselves to humans…
- Usually through people opening themselves to the dark world of spiritual forces.
Right? I would not mess around with witches or tarot cards or seances. I would not go to a Hindu yoga class…
- I would not go near new age spirituality or new age healing practices…
- And on a more general level, I would be very careful about generational things like masonic influences
- Or even at a base level, spirits of control or lust or gossip that we can let get a foothold in our lives that eventually become a spiritual stronghold on our lives.
- If you are wanting to identify this stuff… look for the lies that you believe or the things that control you… almost irrationally.
- And if you have opened yourself up to these things or you see areas of your life that you cant get control of…
I really cant recommend the Re:New weekend coming up in March highly enough…
- It’s an opportunity to hear great teaching around living fully in the freedom Christ has won for us,
- And lots of time and space over the weekend to have ministry and time with God to see breakthrough come.
OK, so back to the passage… so the impure Spirit that has control over this man recognizes who Jesus is, in a way that no one else at this stage has.
- “You are the holy one of God.”
- So Jesus says “be quiet” which can be translated as “shut up.”
- He then commands the impure spirit to “come out of him”
- So there is a shaking and the impure spirit leaves.
Now you and I might be a bit unfamiliar with this whole deliverance side of Jesus ministry and what this is all about… and we can kind of read over this…
- But demonization was an epidemic in Jesus day, as it is in much of the world today…
- I remember seeing this for the first time in Kenya 20 years ago…
- A woman at a meeting at Nairobi Pentecostal church came in… she had moved from the countryside and was staying with her aunt… who it turned out was a witch
- And in the meeting as the name of Jesus was proclaimed, her eyes rolled back, a masculine voice came out of her and her limbs became distorted…
- So she was taken to a room where she was prayed for and delivered…
- And I got to say to little Timmy… that was quite the experience seeing all that!
Anyhow, in Jesus day there are all kinds of records of this stuff going on…
- Rabinic writings on exorcism… and they are all kind of elaborate and complex as to how to see someone delivered
- So people would invoke the authority of Solomon or the prophet Isaiah and you would evoke their authority… and then go through a ritual.
And that could involve all kinds of crazy stuff like holding feces up to the victims nose to try and drive the demon out…
- Or you would pour water over the victim trying to wash the demon out
- Or, probably the most hectic, was where they would drill a hole in the victim’s skull to let the demon out, and then the victim, if they survived would wear the bone around his or her neck as an amulet to ward off an impure spirit.
- And this was actually common. I heard about one archeological dig. They dug up a cemetery, which is kind of mean.
- I don’t know why they did that, but they dug up a cemetery, and out of 120 people in the cemetery, six had a hole in their head because of this.
Now, here’s what’s crazy. Jesus doesn’t do any of that.
- There’s no in the name of so-and-so abracadabra… There’s no Harry Potter going on here, right? There’s just none of that.
- What does Jesus do? “Shut up” and “come out”…
- And it works, which is why the people are so amazed and ask each other what is this? A new teaching and with authority… with exousia…
- He even gives orders to impure spirits and they obey him. The people are amazed… a word used all though out Mark’s gospel.
And so no surprise, news about him spread quickly… and it basically has been ever since!
- Right, I was at a party on Friday night and this guy told me his life story of woe… and I said “mate, you need Jesus!”
- The whole region of Galilee… right Jesus goes viral… and it is just the beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God.
- I mean it was for this man in the synagogue who had been oppressed by an impure spirit.
- It was for the multiple more people set free we will learn about next week…
- And it was for that lady in Nairobi who had come under the spell of her witch aunt.
- But what about for you and for me?
- What do we do with Jesus the deliverer?
Now we could stop there and go – this was all super interesting… and there is probably a few of us thinking… yep… lets just stop there… easy Tim… lets not get too spiro…
- But what if that power was there for you to be set free…
- What if that power was there for you to minister this freedom to others?
- After all, clearly the same kingdom of God that broke into the world through the ministry of Jesus is still at work today for you and I?
- And after all, Jesus clearly commissioned his disciples to cast out evil in the middle of Mark’s gospel…
And what are Jesus last words to them in Mark’s gospel after his resurrection?
- He says (Mark 16:16-17) “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation… and these signs will accompany those who believe, in my name they will drive out demons.”
- And what do we see in the Book of Acts? Impure spirits are cast out by Holy Spirit filled believers…
- And how – using the authority of the name of Jesus.
- Right, what ever we come across… we don’t have to go all Harry Potter abracadabra…
- We, like the disciples in the Book of Acts simply invoke the authority of the name of Jesus.
So what do we do with all of this?
- Well I think we go after it…
- If we, even as Christians can have an impure spirit oppressing us… wouldn’t it be better to use the authority of Jesus to be set free?
- And I know there are debates around how this interplays with mental health issues
- And how this interplays with addictions and bad habits…
- But don’t you think the name of Jesus is powerful?
- And don’t you think that the same presence of God in Jesus that is available to us…
- Just might be wanting to do something powerful in our generation of anxiety and control and violence and spiritual openness…
So, how should we respond
- Well firstly, thank God for Jesus and the good news of the Kingdom of God.
- He has come to save and deliver and to restore.
- Whatever you are going through, or whatever may have hold of you is not the final word.
- The final word is Jesus.
- And the final authority is Jesus.
- And the key to your freedom is Jesus!
You know I can’t save anyone… but I can preach the good news of Jesus and his Kingdom.
And I believe he will move… and work and set free.
I can’t heal anyone but I can pray over the sick the powerful name of Jesus
And I can’t set anyone free, but I can invoke the authority of Jesus