The Familiar Response

This morning, we return to our study of the Gospel of Mark, and we pick up in Chapter 6 with a new turn in the story of Jesus’ ministry. In Chapter 6, Mark tells us of six different responses to Jesus. Today, we begin with the familiar response to Jesus. As we consider this, there is one point I want you to walk away with today –Saving faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior is not just a simple knowledge, a nostalgic affinity, or a commitment to tradition, but a belief in his power and authority that changes your life. To see that, let’s read Mark 6:1-6. 

To understand this passage, I want to break down the central point into its negative and positive parts. First, the negative – Saving faith in Jesus Christ is not just a simple knowledge, a nostalgic affinity, or a commitment to tradition. To see that, consider verses 1-3. In verse 1, we find that Jesus has come again to his hometown of Nazareth. As was his custom, on the Sabbath, he goes to the synagogue to teach, but in his hometown he receives a very different response from Capernaum and Jerusalem. Everywhere else, his teaching is met with amazement and delight. But here, where he grew up, the people take offense. Why? I think there are three reasons wrapped up in the astonished questions they ask in verses 2 and 3. First, they cannot believe what they hear because they grew up with Jesus. We see this in the fact that they ask, “Is this not the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?” The people to whom Jesus is preaching had babysat him. They’d bullied him in the fifth grade. They’d played with him on the soccer team. They’d worked in his dad’s shop alongside him. There is a special kind of doubt that comes from growing up with Jesus, and this doubt can even exist today. Most of us in this room grew up with Jesus. We walked with him through his ministry as we looked at those colorful pictures of him in our children’s Sunday school class. The preacher explained the miracles of Jesus in a children’s sermon. We reenacted the stories of his birth and death in Christmas plays and Easter egg hunts. We were taught to pray in church and at every meal. Praise God for all of that discipleship and for the faithful men and women who ensured that we became so familiar with Jesus. But, in all of that, we could have known Jesus like a brother, but never as our king. We could have walked with him as friend, but never as lord. This is the dreadful state the writer of Hebrews warns of in Heb. 6:4, “For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance.” This passage warns of just this kind of familiarity with Jesus. There were those in the early Hebrew church who saw the answered prayers, sat under the faithful preaching of the word, and partook in the blessings of baptism and communion, but who never really believed it and ended up walking away. Oh friend, do not be like these who know Jesus but do not trust him.

Second, the people of Nazareth rejected Jesus because he was like them. They ask, “Where did this guy get all this knowledge and power? Isn’t he the carpenter?” Jesus was, indeed, a carpenter, and he had very likely worked alongside many of these people on the great building projects of king Herod. He didn’t go to college, didn’t study at rabbinical school, and wasn’t from a priestly family. So, he had no authority, according to worldly standards. He was just like all the other commoners in the village. Again, even today, we can run the risk of having this sort of attitude towards Jesus. We can view Jesus with a sort of nostalgic affinity. I see this sort of affinity for Jesus all the time in pop-culture. You find it in music, where the artist sings “Jesus take the wheel”. You see it in sports, when the athlete (fresh from a rant full of profanity), spreads the chalk under his eyes in the shape of a cross. You see it in social media, as memes with Jesus offering an encouraging word spread across Facebook. Now, to be sure, there are plenty of artists and athletes and Facebook users who are sincere and faithful Christians, but there are also those who view Jesus more like a mascot than a king. There are those who, in times of trouble, plead, “Jesus take the wheel”, but in times of peace, never speak his name. There are those who quote Scripture as motivation to play a sport but could not be bothered with faithful commitment to discipleship. There are those who find in Jesus a source of comfort for their stress but who find submission to weekly worship to be far too bothersome. Friend, do not be like those who have an affinity for Jesus but do not trust him.

Finally, the people of Nazareth rejected Jesus because he was unworthy to speak to them. In the questions they ask of Jesus, there is an implied accusation. We find this implied accusation in verse 3, as they ask, “Is not this the carpenter, the Son of Mary?” In Jewish culture, a person was known by his father’s name, like our surname today. So, my name might have been Nathan son of Timothy, or Nathan Bar Timothy. Jesus’ name should have been, Jesus Bar Joseph. But, that is not what they call him. They say, Jesus Bar Mary. And we know why. Jesus was born into scandal because of his virgin birth (As an interesting sidenote, for the skeptic who would say that only Matthew and Luke refer to the virgin birth, that is not true, as it is implied here). This is what it means, at the end of verse 3, when it says that they “took offense” at him. The Greek word for “took offense” is skandalizo. In other words, they saw the very act of his teaching and healing to be a scandal because he was a bastard child. We too can have this kind of familiarity with Jesus today. You see, it is a broader theme of the NT that the whole of Jesus’s life, ministry, and sacrifice was a scandal. 1 Pet. 2:7-8 says, “So the honor is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe, ‘the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone,’ and ‘a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense [or skandalon]”. 1 Cor. 1:23 says, “But we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block [or skandalon] to the Jews and a folly to Gentiles.” Why is Jesus a scandal? Well, for one, he did not meet with the expectations of the traditions of men. There is an interesting thing about this word, skandalon. In fact, you notice it in the two verses I just quoted. A skandalon was an architectural term. Back in the day, when a carpenter like Jesus or Joseph got ready to build a house, he would first go out to the quarry and pick a rock to use as the cornerstone for the foundation. This rock was of the utmost importance, as every other rock laid in the foundation would be squared to it. So, if the cornerstone was not perfectly square, then the walls of the foundation would run and the house would end up out of shape. So, a builder would go through the quarry, pick up a rock, measure it, and for every one that failed to meet his standard of squareness, he would pronounce it to be “skandalon.” A skandalon was a rock that did not meet the standard of the builder. So, Peter and Paul both say that Jesus was a skandalon. The builders (the leaders of Israel) were looking for a rock that would fit into their traditions. They were looking for a rock that would affirm their rules and regulations. They were looking for a rock that would uphold their expectations for the Messiah. But, instead, Jesus came announcing a kingdom of grace and truth, and they, in turn, rejected him. We too can be so familiar with Jesus that we reject him because he does not meet with our traditions. Many times, we have a set view of the good life, the way things should be, and Jesus comes in and completely interrupts all of that, like a rock determined to crush our expectations. We might accept the tradition of worldly success, thinking that a commitment to our career and hard work will give us fulfillment, but then Jesus calls us to order our lives around him. We might accept the tradition of worldly pleasure, thinking that we will find fulfillment in sex and substances, but then Jesus calls us to offer our bodies as a living sacrifice. In that moment of scandal, we might be tempted, like the leaders of Israel, to reject the true cornerstone, Jesus Christ, for the sake of our own building project. Friend, do not be like those who trust tradition and do not trust Jesus.

With all that considered, let’s go back to the main point of this sermon and consider the positive side of that statement – saving faith in Jesus Christ is a belief in his power and authority that changes your life. In verses 4-6 we find the reaction of Jesus to this rejection. First, Jesus offers a proverb – “A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown.” This proverb recognizes the danger of familiarity. You know what this is like if you’ve ever tried to confront a family member or friend about their sin. More than likely, they will come back at you with some ancient memory of what you did when you were twelve. That memory has nothing to do with their sin or with who you are as an adult, but it is all they need to reject what you have to say.

Then, in verse 5, we are presented with a bit of a challenge. It says there that Jesus could not do any mighty works because of their unbelief. Now, we might make the mistake of reading this to say that God has no ability to do anything unless we believe, and this is a very dangerous way to read it. There are plenty of people who think they can control God in just such a way. They might bargain with God, saying, “Lord, if you will do X, then I will obey you”, as though God needs your obedience. They might think that God can only work through positive thinking or good energy, or that those things have power in and of themselves. All of that is wrong. Rather, what this means is simply what Paul explains in Romans 3. There are two ways through which we can receive the blessings of God. One way is through complete obedience to the Law of God. But, there is a problem with that way – “there is none righteous, no not one.” No one can do it! Thank God, there is another way: the way of faith. God has chosen that only those who have faith will receive the blessings of his kingdom. Think of it this way. Let’s say I have a big pot of chili on this cold Sunday morning, and I invite everyone who has a bowl to come get some. If you come up here empty handed, guess what? You won’t get to enjoy my delicious chili. Did your lack of bowl change my chili? No! It just meant that you couldn’t receive it. Faith is like that bowl. This is what is meant here, when it is says that Jesus could do no mighty work. It was not because he was powerless to do so, or that the lack of faith stole his power, but because there was no faith to receive it. Friend, if you are to receive the blessing of eternal life, it must be through a life-changing faith in Jesus Christ. Simple knowledge of him will not do. An affinity for Jesus is not enough. Adherence to the traditions of men is not it. Only a belief in the power of Christ and his ability to save you will do.