Sermon Tone Analysis

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Introduction
Good morning and welcome to Dishman Baptist Church on this snowy weekend.
It is always a privilege to be with you and to open the Word of God with you but on weekends like this when weather could have prevented it, it is that much sweeter to be together in the house of the Lord.
Please take your Bibles and open them with me to Mark 3, Mark 3.
I’m a big fan of epic movie series.
I’ve seen all of the Star Wars films with the exception of the last one - so please don’t anyone pull me aside after this to talk about my opinions.
I’ve seen a lot of the Marvel movies - but I haven’t seen all of them.
I love the intermingled plot lines, the constant action, the growth of the characters.
One epic film series that I love above all others though has to be the Lord of the Rings series.
Such a captivating story full of action, mystery, etc.
The fifth highest grossing film series of all time definitely has one thing that the others do not.
It has sweeping vistas and scenes of characters traveling from place to place.
It’s not simply action but moments of catching one’s breath before the next round of action take place.
Why do I mention all of that?
Because this is what we’ve come to in Mark.
It seems to be an odd portion of the book as it doesn’t really seem to fit Mark’s dedication to constant action.
He’s come to a transition and so he provides us a moment to catch our breaths as he summarizes the early ministry of Jesus and introduces us to the disciples that Jesus would choose.
But if that is all that we take from this passage this morning we are going to miss out.
Mark is setting us up for something.
Let’s read the passage and then I’ll explain what I mean.
With your Bibles open to Mark 3, look with me at verses 7-19.
The importance of this passage is not found so much in what is said - although there are very significant things being introduced in this passage, but in what is about to be said.
With the exception of the next couple of weeks where there will be a slight return to the conflict narrative that we have been looking at, what Mark is about to introduce us to is the difference between being a part of the crowd following Jesus and being one of His disciples.
Even the narratives that we will encounter in chapter 5 regarding a demon possessed man, a woman with a bleeding issue and a little girl who has passed away all revolve around the distinguishing characteristic of faith.
But I’m getting ahead of myself so lets look at the passage we have in front of us today.
We’re going to see two distinct comparisons set out before us - that of the crowd and the disciples.
Interestingly, Luke reverses the order of these two events.
In Luke 6, Christ chooses the 12 disciples or apostles and then coming down from the mountain He is confronted by the crowds.
Mark chooses to place the events in his Gospel differently.
So we must ask ourselves why does Mark choose to order these in this way?
What is the point he is attempting to make?
In light of all that is about to come in this next section the point is that there is a significant difference between being a disciple and being a part of the crowd.
There are some defining characteristics of each that Mark chooses to reveal.
As we look at the crowd we’re going to see the characteristic of false popularity, preeminent power (not of the crowd but of Christ) and then false proclamations.
When we look at the disciples we’re going to see the true devotion and true development that should be defining characteristics of every disciple.
And at the end we’re going to have to evaluate ourselves to determine whether we really are a disciple or we’re just one of the crowd.
The Crowd
Mark starts off with a comment that brings to a close all that has just transpired in Capernaum.
He says that Christ departs with His disciples to the sea.
Just prior to this Mark revealed the murderous intent of the Pharisees and the Herodians as a result of Christ’s teachings and impunity in His ministry.
To the naked eye it may look as if Christ is running away because He knows there is a plot in the works to take His life.
But unlike fairy tales or novel heroes such as C.S. Lewis’ Prince Caspian, where the main character runs away to preserve his own life, Christ did not fear death.
In fact death was the purpose for which He had come.
He departs not out of some desire for self-preservation or to avoid further provocation of His adversaries but instead, just as with His previous departure from Capernaum, there was important work yet to be done that necessitates this action on His part.
And so He departs to the sea - but if He hoped for an opportunity to be alone no such opportunity would be afforded to Him.
Pfalse Popularity
In the year 2008 a little known preacher/evangelist by the name of Todd Bentley came south from Canada and preached at Ignited Church in Lakeland, Florida.
It was his second visit to the church and he was scheduled to be there for five nights of evangelistic revival meetings.
As a result of his charisma and some exaggerated stories of miraculous healings what results has been dubbed as the Florida Outpouring.
It was a “revival” that lasted from April until August of 2008.
By the end of June the crusade reported some 400,000 visitors from over 100 nations.
The whole event devolved into a farcical/tragic comedy as Bentley left in August because of an alcohol addiction and marital unfaithfulness.
He revealed that he had often been under the influence of alcohol on stage during the events.
But the event was a great curiosity for as long as it lasted.
Now we know that Christ was not an inebriated manchild that traipsed around on stage wearing oversized t-shirts and kicking old ladies in the stomach or other people in the face.
The point is that it only takes a certain amount of curiosity to draw an enormous crowd.
That is what we see on display here.
Mark tells us that people came from everywhere.
There was a large crowd from Galilee which of course there would be since His ministry had focused predominantly on the region of Galilee.
But there was also a large crowd that came to Him from Judea and Jerusalem.
The word regarding Jesus had gotten out of Galilee and traveled south to Judea and the holy city of Jerusalem.
But it hadn’t stopped there - Idumea was a province southeast of Judea and it was predominantly Gentile in makeup.
“Beyond the Jordan” are regions to the east of Jerusalem.
Tyre and Sidon were northwest of Galilee toward the Mediterranean Sea.
The fame of Jesus was comprehensive, it was global - and of course it should have been because unlike the charlatan we just referred to, Christ was the real thing.
He was God in flesh, the Messiah.
And so certainly the next words that Mark is going to use describing this crowd is the mass baptisms and the repentances that took place.
But instead he says that they came to Him because of all that they had heard He was doing.
They didn’t seek Christ for who He was, they sought Him for what they could personally get from Him.
So here we see an important principle of being a member of the crowd - they seek Jesus only for what they perceive they can gain or get from Him.
Despite the conflicts with the religious leaders, on this day these people were all too willing to seek Christ - and His appeal was universal.
Even Gentiles were drawn in by His magnetic pull.
Yet there would be a day, when His usefulness to them individually had been used up (or so they thought as they overlooked their deepest, truest need) when they would return again to the religious leader’s side as they joined with them in calling for His crucifixion.
We need to understand that these were massive crowds.
Mark is making the point here that Christ’s ministry draw was larger than even that of John the Baptist.
Mark says a large crowd from Galilee, and a large crowd from the other regions.
This was a crowd numbering in the thousands, tens of thousands and possibly up to one hundred thousand.
There have been estimates that the number of people at the feeding of the 5,000 was in the range of 20-25,000 people based on the reporting only being for the 5,000 men.
This crowd would have been equally as large if not larger.
They had come to see the spectacle.
They’d come to see the miracle healer.
And Jesus didn’t disappoint.
Preeminent Power
Jesus requests that His disciples make a boat ready so that the crowd would not crush Him.
This is not like the modern day iterations of celebrity.
It is always interesting to watch the beginnings of pseudo-events like the recent Golden Globe awards.
The lights, the cameras, the beautiful people all walking up and down the red carpet.
What is most interesting is the standoff distance at which the “crowds” are kept.
As if the beautiful people are too special to intermingle with the commoners.
Jesus was never that way and so we must be careful not to read our modern idea into this request.
The boat would serve the purpose of self-protection as there was danger that the crowd could overwhelm and crush Him.
The other purpose for the boat is that over the next few chapters Jesus and His disciples would traverse the Sea of Galilee to several different locations and having a boat prepared for travel would assist in those journeys.
Jesus always responded to the needs of the crowd with compassion.
Whether it was Peter’s mother-in-law, the leper, or a paralytic on a mat who literally dropped in on His head, He always took the time to care for people’s needs.
And His power was undeniable.
He demonstrated what Paul wrote in Colossians 1:17
Christ demonstrates His power over the natural world as He heals things that even today in our modern medical environment cannot be healed.
We may be able to fit someone with a prosthetic limb to replace a hand that has lost neurological function but we cannot in a moment regrow a hand that has died.
We may, with hours of surgery and physical therapy, be able to restore the ability to walk to a man who has been paralyzed but we cannot in an instant tell him to get out of bed and walk home.
We may be able to give someone Tylenol and a cool bath and watch a fever break over the course of a few hours but we cannot simply take a person by the hand and lift her out of bed completely, instantly restored.
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