The life-changing gospel of Jesus is not just a saying, it changes lives.
! When Christ came to Simon Peter and to Andrew, they left the seashore.
When he came to James and John, they left Zebedee, their dad, and the family business.
And followed Christ.
When he came to a Jewish tax collector, contracted to the Romans to rip off the Jews, Matthew
walked away from the tax booth.
All of their lives were changed.
All became disciples of Christ, those intimate twelve that walked with him.
Later, Peter spread the gospel like no other in the days after the ascension of the Lord.
John was used mightily of God.
We've got four books in the New Testament that show that.
He mentions twice among those works the reason why he writes what he does, the purpose behind it.
It's found one time in John chapter 20, verse 31.
He said, I write these events so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God,
and that by believing you may have life in his name.
It was the reason he wrote.
Matthew never returned to the tax booth, but he took his pen with him.
And instead of keeping an account of people's taxes, instead he wrote an account of the works of Christ.
It is the first book of the New Testament.
The gospel really does change lives.
Now, I could go around this room this morning and ask you to share how Christ has changed your life.
And many of you could immediately share how Christ has changed your life.
And many of you would look at me and say, don't you dare stick a microphone in my face.
I understand that too.
However, I will tell you that if you're a child of God this morning and Christ has changed your life,
you need to be ready to give an account of that to any and all that God puts in your path.
The gospel, the real gospel is life-changing.
And others need to hear it, and we need to share it as Christ has commissioned us to,
and we need to hear ourselves sharing it because it reminds us of what we got when we got Christ.
But don't you dare think that when you do that, that everybody's going to be happy with you.
Don't you dare believe that everybody is going to be agreeable or that everybody's going to be celebrating with you.
When Jesus came, lives were changed, and everybody wasn't happy about it.
But we've already seen some of that, and it just keeps building throughout this gospel.
And Jesus has an answer for it.
It's found in Mark chapter 2, beginning in verse 18, and it says,
Now John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting.
And people came and said to him,
Why do John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?
And Jesus said to them,
Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them?
As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast.
The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them,
and then they will fast in that day.
No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on old garment.
If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made.
And no one puts new wine into old wineskins.
If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins.
But new wine is for fresh wineskins.
People resist change.
They don't like it.
Mark Twain said,
The only people who like change are wet babies.
And C.S. Lewis said,
Everyone wants progress, but nobody wants change.
Jesus brought change.
Everywhere he went, he brought change.
He still brings change.
And the change in a life given to Christ is the evidence of the reality of Christ in that life.
But that does not mean that everyone will like it.
They won't.
I remember I mentioned last week with all the good news of the gospel
that there also comes the scorn of the gospel from a lot of people.
And I want you to watch this progression that we've already seen in the gospel of Mark.
We'll continue to see it.
Christ comes to Capernaum.
He's teaching.
And Mark tells us that he teaches with great authority, quote, unlike the scribes.
Well, now that's a hint of what's coming down the pike.
One with a demon comes to him.
He casts out the demon.
That draws a crowd.
He heals many in the crowd.
And then he goes out preaching throughout Galilee and the surrounding areas,
casting out demons as he goes from village to village.
The crowd grows as he goes.
More lives are affected.
He comes back to Capernaum.
And when he comes back to Capernaum, the pharisaical scribes come to hear him.
They've heard about him.
They come to hear him.
They're sitting in the front row in that home when he heals a paralytic and takes away his sins.
And when Jesus said he took away the man's sins, well, that's a claim that he's God.
And the scribes, because nobody can take away sins but God.
And so the scribes didn't like it.
He changes Levi, also known as Matthew's life.
And then he sits down with Matthew's friends in a big banquet in Matthew's house with other tax collectors and, quote, sinners.
That really upset them.
Now we get to our passage today and the Pharisees are apparently involved in a fast that Jesus has not acknowledged.
And they want to know why he's not fasting.
Now, I want to be clear.
Jesus fasted.
He fasted in the desert for 40 days.
And he gave instructions to his disciples in Matthew 6 about how to fast.
He did it.
And he expected it to be done.
It is still a great godly discipline to fast for prayerful reasons.
You'll see a pattern of that in the Old Testament of God's people fasting.
Sometimes in preparation, they inquired of the Lord concerning what their next steps would be.
Sometimes they fasted asking God to intervene in their circumstances.
You also see them fasting when they're repenting or when they're mourning over their sins.
There's only one fast that is prescribed in Scripture in the Old Testament.
And that's the Day of Atonement or Yom Kippur, which is coming up this Thursday.
And that's the only time that they were asked to fast on that Day of Atonement.
But in addition to that, you see all kinds of other fasts that are called for special called reasons.
There's one-day fast.
There's three-day fast.
There's seven-day fast.
There's 40-day fast, as our Lord did in the desert.
They fasted more during the exile than any other time because they wasn't at home.
And they wanted to go home.
And they were asking God to help them in the midst of that.
The Purim fast was established after God used Esther to save the Jews.
And God's people were fasting and praying for Esther in that circumstance.
And God used her for such a time as this.
And after he used her, they established the Purim fast to remember how God brought them out through Esther's obedience.
However, by the time we get to our passage in Mark chapter 2, the Pharisees have added to that.
They make it a habit to fast.
They fast twice a week, Mondays and Thursdays.
And they want people to know that they do that.
As a matter of fact, they put whitener on their face to make themselves look more pale.
They put a sick look on their faces.
And they walk around in gloom, trying to get people's attention.
Don't do that.
Okay?
Don't do that.
If you're having a colonoscopy tomorrow and you're preparing for it, you can do that.
Okay?
But do it at home.
Okay?
Because it could get ugly.
But I'll hear about that at lunch.
But anyway, we need not look like folks of gloom and doom.
If Christ is within us, it ought to reflect, inform your face of what God's done in your heart.
And that's what Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount.
He said in Matthew 6, this is what he's referring to, is this fasting process.
Matthew 6, 16 through 18, he says this.
And when you fast, that's instructions too fast, by the way.
And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites.
For they disfigure their faces, that their fasting may be seen by others.
Truly I say to you, they have received the reward.
But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others,
but by your Father who is in heaven in secret.
And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
He also refers to this in a parable that he uses in Luke chapter 18.
When the Pharisee prays, God, I thank you that I'm not like other men.
And then he starts naming other people that he's, and what they do, and how they act, and all that stuff,
that he's not like them.
And then he says, and I fast twice a week.
That's his prayer.
Apparently our passage speaks of a time when the Pharisees are participating in one of their regular fasts
while Jesus is feasting with the sinners and the tax collectors.
I guess it was on a Thursday or maybe a Monday.
Whatever.
They were very upset about that.
Not only was the Pharisees fasting, but also John's disciples were fasting.
Speaking of John the Baptist.
Now, I want to be clear about something.
The Pharisees and the disciples of John were not partners by any means,
but they're both fasting as well.
John's disciples are fasting in anticipation of a coming Messiah that John had talked about.
Let me explain.
When John the Baptist was preaching in the wilderness of Judea before Christ came,
he drew quite a crowd.
Matthew chapter 3 verse 5 says,
Then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him.
So there were literally thousands of people that were coming out there.
Okay.
Different people on different days, but they were coming.
You know who else came out to hear him?
The Pharisees.
As a matter of fact, when they came out to hear him,
John the Baptist called them children of snakes.
He confronted them because he saw their hypocrisy.
In addition to that, Jesus went out to John.
And Jesus told John to baptize him.
But I want to be clear about something.
All those people that believe John's message
and all those people who follow John along the way,
they were not there, not all of them, when John baptized Jesus.
And then, it wasn't long after that baptism that John the Baptist is arrested.
He's thrown in prison.
He will be killed.
But by him being thrown in prison,
it preempts him from getting the message out that the Messiah had come.
We see in the book of Acts, there's questions about it from John's disciples.
So either they didn't witness the baptism,
and apparently they didn't witness it,
nor did they hear that Jesus had come,
so they didn't know.
So they're still fasting in anticipation of the Messiah
that John the Baptist proclaimed so loudly.
The combination of these two groups,
distinctive groups, but they have a common bond.
They're both fasting.
The combination of these two groups caused people to ask questions.
And when they asked, Jesus answered.
And he addressed three matters.
The first thing he addressed is the insufficiency of a man-made gospel.
The insufficiency of a man-made gospel.
Listen, religion is what many people rely on,
and religion is empty without Christ.
And if in Christ, it's not religion, it's relationship.
It's relationship with Christ.
Salvation does not come through our actions.
We cannot earn it.
Salvation does not come through our sacrifice.
We cannot buy it.
Salvation does not come through our appearance,
no matter how gloomy or pitiful that we may try to look.
It does not come through our knowledge.
Satan knows about the things of God and knows Scripture quite well.
It does not come that way.
Judaism was to prepare the Jews for Jesus.
However, they missed Jesus.
And without an acknowledgment of Jesus, it is condemning.
Any works-based system is condemning.
Any of them.
No matter how many confessions are made,
no matter how many candles are burned,
no matter how many communions are taken,
outside of a surrender to Christ,
Catholicism is just a man-made religion.
It is empty ritual outside of Christ.
No matter how many missions are served,
no matter how many temples are attended,
no matter how many caffeinated drinks are abstained,
for a Mormon, it's just empty man-made religion without Christ.
And it's not the Christ that they have created
because the Christ that the Mormon church has created
is not part of the Trinity.
Their Christ was not divine while he was on the earth.
And you have to earn it through works and efforts.
Friend, listen, that's not Christ.
That's a cult.
And when they accept Christ by grace through faith,
they'll leave false, empty religion.
However, without Christ, it's just a religion.
Jehovah's Witnesses can knock on doors until the cows come home.
But they'll never know Jesus as long as they believe that he's a mere archangel
and not Almighty God.
And let's just bring it on home while we're here.
Listen, old Baptists.
Good old Baptists.
No matter how much you attend,
no matter how much you give,
and I encourage you to do both,
it does your soul no good without Christ.
You need the Lord Jesus.
You cannot align yourself to Jesus
or buy your way to Jesus.
You must surrender your life to Christ
and let him have his way,
not in some way in your life,
in every way in your life.
The man-made gospel,
even with fasting,
even with sacrifice,
is insufficient for salvation.
That only comes by faith in Christ.
My salvation
does not rest in me.
It rests in the cross of Christ.
And no one can snatch me out of the hand of the Father.
We rest there.
Any man-made gospel is insufficient.
He also says,
he also speaks to and addresses the seamless nature of the real gospel.
And he gives three illustrations in this passage.
And I want to deal with the second two first.
It's in verse 21 and 22,
and it says this,
no one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment.
If he does,
the patch tears away from it.
The new one from the old
and the worst tear is made.
And no one puts new wine into old wineskins.
If he does,
the wine will burst the skins
and the wine is destroyed.
And so are the skins.
But new wine
is for fresh wineskins.
In that day,
juice was stored in pouches
made of goat skin.
A goat was skinned
and the hide would be uncut
except at the legs and the neck.
That skin was cleaned.
It was turned,
usually it was turned inside out.
It was sealed shut at the leg openings.
That left the neck as a spout
that made it easy to pour.
Fresh skins are elastic
and they could expand.
So when you put juice into them
and that begins to ferment,
that skin will expand.
However,
if you have an old skin
and you put new juice in it
and it ferments into wine,
it'll burst
and not only will the skin be ruined,
but you'll lose the juice as well.
The wine will be gone.
He also speaks
of an unshrunk patch of clothing
being sewn to older clothing
and that will not work
because the first time you wash it,
the patch will shrink
and it'll tear away
from the clothing
that has already been washed
and has already shrunk.
What's he saying
when he says all that?
You can't take the gospel
of Jesus Christ
and force it
into old man-made forms
of religion.
That's what he's saying.
God's doing a new thing.
You can't put God in a box.
God does not do patchwork.
He makes seamless transitions
and when one comes to Christ,
the old is gone,
the new has come.
To put it another way,
a new believer
is like a new wineskin
and the Spirit of God
is poured in
through salvation
to that new believer
and God ferments
in our lives.
He also often speaks
of yeast in dough
and the impact of that
and so he ferments
in our lives
and we thank God,
expand for his glory.
Try to fit God
into your ways
and our ways.
Something's got to give.
Listen,
when Christ takes over
your life,
it's because a person
has given in
and allowed God
to stretch him or her
instead of just trying
to piecemeal God
into your lives.
Folks,
don't try to patch Jesus
into your life.
Give him your life.
Don't find some caveat
in your life
that's not going well
and say,
Jesus,
can you handle this for me
and not give him
your entire life.
That's what he's speaking of.
He takes all of our life
and we entrust
all of our life to him.
He makes all things new
and he does it
in a seamless fashion.
Listen,
salvation is not patchwork
over a rough spot
in your life.
That's not what it is.
It's a surrender
of your life to Christ.
It's renewal
of your life
to him.
But not only that,
but he also addresses
the celebration
in the real gospel.
When people
want to know
why he and his disciples
are not fasting,
he states
that it's not time
to fast.
It's time
for celebration.
You fast
in anticipation
and Jesus says,
I'm here.
There's nothing
to anticipate.
I'm before you.
Christ is already
on the scene.
He compares it
to a wedding.
And a wedding
in that day
was a serious thing.
They lasted
about a week.
And as a father
who has a daughter
who's a fiance,
I am thankful today
that our weddings
don't last a week.
Very thankful.
When you were invited
to a wedding,
all other things
were shelved,
by rabbinical law,
one was exempt
from their religious duties
if they were invited
to a wedding.
And you know why
they did that?
Because it would be
inappropriate
to fast
at a wedding.
Don't come in
in your white face.
Don't come in
with your gloom
and doom
into a celebration
of a wedding.
Do nothing
to dampen
the spirit.
This wedding
is not about you.
In our day,
it's all about the bride.
In that day,
it was all about
the bridegroom.
But it's about
the couple
that's getting married.
It's not about you.
And as long as
the bridegroom
is present,
all are to celebrate.
Now in mentioning this,
Christ is saying,
I'm the one
you've been waiting on.
I'm the fulfillment
of everything
that you've looked to.
This is it.
But in the midst
of that,
he also prophesies.
And he says
in Mark 2,
verse 20,
he says,
the days will come
when the bridegroom
is taken away
from them
and then they'll
fast in that day.
That term,
taken away,
speaks of a sudden
and violent removal
as in the garden
when Christ
was arrested
and taken to the cross.
It was appropriate
to mourn over that.
It's also like
the ascension of Christ.
And he could have
been referring
to that as well
when Christ suddenly
was lifted
from the earth
and into heaven.
Now,
it's appropriate
for us to fast
today.
It's appropriate
for us to fast
about the condition
of our country.
It's appropriate
for us to fast
about revival
in our church.
It's appropriate
for us to fast
about renewal
and repentance
in our heart.
Let me tell you
something.
This is not
all there is.
And the Lord
Jesus Christ
is coming back
to take his bride,
the church,
to heaven.
Even so,
Lord Jesus,
quickly come.
I heard
this time last week
that the rapture
was going to take place
on this past
Tuesday and Wednesday.
Did y'all hear that?
Well,
I got news for you.
It didn't.
Okay?
If you're wondering,
it didn't.
And you know what?
If they come out
this week and say
it's going to happen
next week,
don't listen to it
because Jesus said
no man knows
the hour or day
but he tells us
to be ready.
I mean,
listen,
we live in a
fascinating time
because we live
in a time
between the coming
of the Holy Spirit
and Acts chapter 2
when now
because through salvation
we can now
be indwelled
with the Spirit
of God
and at the same time
we come before,
we live now
before the coming
of the Lord Jesus
as emphasized
in 1 Thessalonians
chapter 4.
So now
it's a time
to fast
because we need
prayer that is
real
and intense
and means
something to us.
However,
it's also a time
to celebrate
because thank God
Christ is here.
He walks
among us.
He lives
within us.
We need to live
with joy
in our hearts.
We need to smile,
have smiles
on our faces
and if we
have had an
encounter
with Christ,
if we
have been
changed by Christ
and we have
an anticipation
in our eyes
of Christ,
the free
opportunity
to come to Christ
is before us.
I'm thankful
for that.
Romans 10
verse 13
says,
for everyone
who calls
upon the name
of the Lord
will be
saved.
It's not
time for
dead religion.
It's not
time to throw
Jesus in the
mix
or to
sew him
into the
pattern of
your life.
No,
no,
the gospel
of Jesus
Christ
is exclusive.
It's not
mixed in
like patchwork.
It's not
dead.
it's not
gloomy.
It's time
to leave
behind what
needs to
go,
folks.
It's time
for us
to go
with God
with what
he would
have for
us.
Let's quit
being selfish
about the
things that
we're trying
to cling
to and
instead
sell out
and follow
him.
It's time.
The opportunity
is now and
I don't want
us to miss
it.
Let's spend
the rest
of our
days
celebrating
our
Savior
and then
celebrating
with our
Savior
for all
of
eternity.
I got
news for
you.
The greatest
opportunity that
you'll ever
have in your
life
is to give
your heart
and life
to the
Lord Jesus
Christ.
It's the
greatest
opportunity that
we'll ever
have.
And when you
do that,
and I'm not
talking about
God get me
out of a
hole.
God pay
this bill
for me.
God will
you straighten
somebody out
for me.
I'm talking
about lock,
stock,
and barrel
folks.
As
imperfect
as I am
oh God,
I give
myself to
you today.
and I ask
you to
forgive me
for what
I've done
wrong.
And I ask
you to come
into my
life and
to change
me.
Like new
wine in
a fresh
wine skin.
Oh dear
God, will
you implant
your spirit
within me
and help
me to live
this day
forward for
your honor
and glory?
I'll do it
imperfectly,
but from
this day
forward,
I want
to live
for you.
I don't
care if
you've been
in church
all your
life or
you've
never
been
in
church.
I don't
care if
you're a
member of
this church
and in
leadership
or you've
never been
in this
church.
If you've
never surrendered
your life to
the Lord
Jesus Christ,
today's the
day of
salvation.
Just give
up and
give in
faith.
Don't
trust him.
Don't
trust some
frame of
religion.
Don't
trust some
ideology.
Trust Jesus.
He'll
change your
life.
And if he
has, other
folks ought to
know it.
It ought to
show on our
face and we
ought to publicly
profess our
faith.
And Jesus
by his
example and
by his
commission
tells us to
do that
through
baptism.
That's the
first step of
obedience for
the new
Christian is
to be
baptized.
If you've
never been
baptized as a
believer,
that's a
hindrance in
your life.
You come,
say,
preacher, I
need to be
baptized.
We're not
doing it this
morning, but
we'll line
that up and
we'll publicly
acknowledge your
faith before
others.
Maybe God's
drawing you to
First Baptist
Church.
This is the
place where he'd
have you to
serve.
And if that
be the case,
just obey him,
just trust him.
We'll guide you
through that
process, but
just trust him.
Just be
obedient to what
he tells you
to do.
And then there's
a possibility that
maybe someone
here that says,
you know what?
I've given my
life to Christ,
and I know that
God's calling me to
do more for him.
He's calling me to
serve him in a
ministry capacity.
I dedicate myself
today to surrender
my life to the
call of God upon
my life.
I wouldn't
encourage it of
anybody who don't
have a call upon
their life by the
Lord and clear,
but if it's clear
and you know it,
you'll never be
satisfied doing
anything else
except following
the Lord Jesus.
And I'll be honest
with you, that
goes for anything
and everything that
he's placed upon
your heart and
life today.
If you'll just
trust him, lay it
down here.
Make these steps
a makeshift altar.
Have a pastor pray
for you.
Do it where you'll
stand in a moment.
Whatever.
Whatever it is you
need to give to God.
Let's sell out.
Let's give it all.
I don't need you,
God, to fit into my
framework.
I'm not trying to
patch my life with you.
I give myself to you.
That's the exclusive
gospel of Jesus Christ.
God, to be honest.
And that's what
changes lives.
With every head bowed
and every eye closed,
if God spoke to you
about any of those
matters this morning,
I will never ask you
to do more than what
God tells you to do.
And I'll never,
well, I'll try my best
and I'll never let you
be satisfied with doing
anything less than that.
You just trust God
today.
And do what God
tells you to do.
Heavenly Father,
as we stand and sing
in just a moment,
help us to simply
be obedient to follow
your will and your way
in every way
in all of our lives.
Lead us right now,
oh God, we pray.
In Jesus' name, amen.