Mark 6 7-13
Pentecost 8
Mark 6:7-13
August 3, 2003
“It’s Your Turn”
Introduction Baseball: This summer I have had the opportunity to see a number of baseball games. Maybe you too have seen a game or two. Whether the game is little league or major league I have noticed one thing in common. Before the players take the field, before they step up to home plate to take their swings, they have had the instruction of the coaches. The coaches show the players how to swing the bat, catch the ball and how to play the game. Often these coaches have played the game before. They have knowledge and experience. They have been done the baseball path before.
Last week we heard about how Jesus preached the good news to the people of His hometown. We learned how He was rejected. This was the path that He had to take. It was the path of rejection that would ultimately lead Him to Jerusalem to suffer rejection by the people as He is beaten and crucified. And of course we now that on the cross He would suffer the ultimate rejection as His own father would turn His back away from Jesus because He bore the sins of the world.
The path of rejection is the lonely road that Christians have been called to walk. Jesus, immediately after leaving Nazareth, continued to preach in the surrounding towns and villages. Then He called His twelve disciples together. Our text reads, “And He called the twelve to Himself, and began to send them out two by two, and gave them power over unclean spirits. He commanded them to take nothing for the journey except a staff -- no bag, no bread, no copper in their money belts -- but to wear sandals, and not to put on two tunics. Also He said to them, "In whatever place you enter a house, stay there till you depart from that place. “And whoever will not receive you nor hear you, when you depart from there, shake off the dust under your feet as a testimony against them. Assuredly, I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the Day of Judgment than for that city!" So they went out and preached that people should repent. And they cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick, and healed them.”
Jesus sent his disciples out to their own hometowns to proclaim the wonderful message of the gospel. That message was that the people should repent of their sin and turn to God for forgiveness. Like Jesus, His disciples would be greeted with both faith and rejection. This was the path that Jesus walked. It was the path that His disciples walked. And now, it is the path that we must walk.
The River Church has made a commitment to walk this path as we have started an Evangelism program. It began as a desire among you; and now that desire has been expressed in the formation of an Evangelism committee. The people on this committee will teach us all how to walk the path of Jesus and the Apostles in our home towns and among the people that we know. They will teach us how to begin to think evangelistically. They will teach us how to meet the people of the world where they are at.
Just as the people of Nazareth had their own opinions about how Gods kingdom should come into the world and come to them we too will meet people with different opinions. Opinions, everybody has one. When talking about faith and religion people often hear the response, “that’s just your opinion”. While this seems like and obstacle it is also an opportunity.
“You have your opinion; I have mine”. We hear it form our children and spouses, from co-workers and bosses. “You have your opinion; I have mine”. We hear it from pro-choicers, gay-rights people and from people who want to put an end to discussion. It is normally the sign that discussion has come to an end. It is a statement of rejection designed to put us off; and normally it does. But it can be an opportunity to create faith and strengthen our own.
Jesus calls us to meet people where they are. Our text tells us that Jesus sent the disciple to where the people lived. Just as Jesus Christ came into the world as a real man, made flesh and blood in His incarnation, we too are to approach the people of the world personally. Jesus told the disciples to stay with the people in their own homes, to live, eat and breathe their lives. Illustration: Dietrich Bonhoeffer, shortly before being executed by the Nazis, said: “During the past year or so I’ve come to know and understand…the profound this-worldliness of Christianity. The Christian is not a (religious man), but simply a man, as Jesus was a man.” Christians live real life in a real world. Christians are in this world but not of it. Therefore, we meet people where they are.
But we don’t leave them there. We are told that we are not only to live with the people around us but we are to confront them with there opinions. This is not easy though. It is something that we naturally would prefer not to do. Our society, in the name of political correctness, even challenges those that do. To confront with the truth is the beginning of honesty. It has nothing to do with being mean spirited or intolerant. If a person talks to a man who has the opinion that 2 plus 2 equals 3, is he not obligated to tell the man the truth that the real answer is 4. Yet we live in a world where a person is labeled intolerant if he doesn’t affirm and accept everyone’s opinions. This is the path of rejection that we must face.
“You have your opinion; I have mine.” When we hear this we are tempted to change the subject and avoid honest talk. Avoid the temptation and engage their opinion. Ask questions like, Tell me why you believe that? Or how did you come to that opinion? Listen to them and what they say because you do value them. Just like you, these are the people that God so loved that He gave His one and only Son Jesus Christ to die so that they may live eternally. After listening to them go onto tell them what you have learned. For instance, “Let me tell you what I believe.” As the Bible says in 1 Peter, “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect...”
Why should you bother? Why should you go against the world like a Salmon swimming upstream? Why should you subject yourself to rejection? Jesus came into the world to meet us were we were and to turn us to God, to turn us from our own false opinions to His truth. He came and called us to repentance from sin and to believe in Him as our Savior. He now uses us as His voice in the world continuing to call people to eternal life. We do not offer the world the opinions of men. We present to them the Word of God, given to us by God through His Son. Jesus Word carries His authority. His Word is powerful. His Word gives healing to the sick, is able to make deaf ears hear and blind eyes see. His word gives life to the dead. His Word, by the power of the Holy Spirit, is able to created faith. Through the Word of God , the Spirit of Jesus engages the world and shatters false opinions. 2 plus 2 does not equal 3. Believing in anything will not give eternal life. There is only one Savior from sin, there is only one way to Heaven and it is through Jesus Christ. We preach repentance and faith in God’s Son Jesus for the forgiveness of sins. In so doing we walk the path of rejection, like Jesus, like the Apostles. But is is also the way of eternal life.
When we proclaim such a message we may have to watch out and stand back. With the Word of God the Heavens and the earth were created. With the message of salvation the gates of hell are closed and the doors of heaven are opened. The results may be hard for us to handle. Illustration: There was a pastor of an old congregation filled with aging people. He bought a bus and drove it all over the sizeable town, a town filled with unwanted people, people who were criminals, drug addicts, the lost and the lonely. They came to the church to hear the message of hope, the message of the gospel. His congregation, however, would not have these people, and actually told them to leave, even saying directly, “We don’t want these kinds of people here.”
When it comes right down to it, they didn’t like the message of repentance for the forgiveness of sins for all people. Instead, they liked to hear how they were a good congregation because they were the third generation of Lutherans in the area. They like the familiarity of each other so much that they could not tolerate the unfamiliar sights, sounds and smells of the unwashed heathens in their grandparent’s sanctuary. The pastor is gone now…and so is the congregation.
This may seem like an extreme example, but I think that it carries a lot of truth for us. Are we prepared to meet the people of the world where they are at? Are we willing to receive people and allow them to become fellow heirs with Christ, with us, even if the don’t have a pedigree among us. We may not directly say that we don’t want these kind of people here, but all to often we say it quietly with our lack of words and lack of warmth. You know, we may not even mean to do it. Just like a good host prepares every detail of the meals and the lodging for overnight guests we are called to prepare this place of Immanuel for those people that the Lord calls to be His.
Our Lord Jesus has gone before us and shown us how to walk the path, to be His witnesses and to embrace the world with the Love of our Heavenly Father. He has shown us how. He sent His disciple out two by two. Now it’s your turn. You are not alone; He walks with you. May you rejoice as you lock the gates of hell and open the gates of heaven, in Jesus precious name.