We have been going through the Gospel of Mark.
We have seen that the Gospel of Mark opens up with the baptism of Jesus,
and he is driven into the wilderness, and then Jesus comes back on the scene,
and in verse 14 and 15 of chapter 1, it says this,
Now that after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee,
proclaiming the Gospel of God and saying,
the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand.
Repent and believe in the Gospel.
That repent and believe in the Gospel, the Gospel of God,
we saw, I think it would be week 1 or week 2,
that the Gospel isn't just a get-out-of-jail-free card.
It's not just a means by which we avoid hell.
The Gospel, the good news of God, is actually Jesus himself.
That Jesus, the person and work of Jesus Christ,
his life, his death, and his resurrection, that is good news.
And what Mark is doing throughout the Gospel is he is leading us on the way to the cross,
and we get to see, progressively, just little bits more of who this Jesus really is.
What he has come to do.
Who he truly is.
Where his authority lies.
What his identity is.
Last week we saw that a part of this good news and this identity of who Jesus is,
is there's this forgiveness of sins.
This deep authority to forgive sins.
Jesus, he forgives this man's sins, who is a paralytic,
and just to validate his authority,
he tells the paralytic to get up, to take his mat, and go home.
But Jesus has authority to heal.
That same authority is also to forgive sins.
And that he also cleanses a leper, a leprous man, completely.
The leprosy is gone.
We start to see that this Messiah figure is a cleanser.
He is a forgiver of sins.
And we're starting to see bits and pieces that, hold on a second,
Jesus does the things that only God can do.
This morning, this afternoon, we continue on,
and we're going to see another aspect of who this Messiah is, who Jesus is.
The good news of God.
We're going to take a look at Mark chapter 2, starting in verse 18.
And we're going to see that what Jesus does, what the gospel is,
is it's complete freedom from self-justification.
From trying to right our own wrongs.
That in fact, what Jesus does on the cross is he justifies us.
He makes us right with God.
No longer do we have to strive for any kind of work that would put us in right standing with God.
And we're going to look at two interactions that Jesus has.
With very religiously pious people.
Really stand-up people in their day.
And in both of these accounts, Jesus, what he does is he deconstructs their false understanding of piety.
And I use that specifically because that is a buzzword in the past year, year and a half, two years.
That is a thing that seems to come up, whether it be in the church or whether it be in just regular society.
Jesus, what he does is he deconstructs, but the right kind of deconstructing.
And he does it from, he deconstructs a false understanding of piety.
Showing the true way to salvation.
So if you have a Bible, join with me.
Mark chapter 2, starting in verse 18.
Again, if you don't have a Bible at any time, you can get up.
Grab a Bible by the glass doors at the back and follow along.
So here's the first scene.
Jesus has disciples now.
And the Pharisees and John the Baptist, he has disciples as well.
They come to Jesus and they say, hey, what's going on?
We pious folk, we are the ones who are showing our piety.
How are we doing that?
By fasting.
I thought, Jesus, I thought you are this righteous man.
Why aren't you fasting?
Why aren't your disciples fasting?
Take a look with me in verse 18.
Halfway down.
Why do John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast?
But your disciples do not fast.
Jesus responds to them and says, can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them?
And we'll pause right there.
Both John's disciples and the Pharisees, like I mentioned, are actually very pious people.
We talk about the Pharisees as if they are the scum of the earth.
If you have been at church for a while, they get this bad rap.
And to be honest, they fail to see Jesus and they are the antagonists in the story, for sure.
But one thing about the Pharisees is that they genuinely had a desire to please God.
They did.
An improper understanding of how to do that, but they had this desire to please God.
And the disciples of John likewise, they were following the ministry of John the Baptist.
They were righteous people.
They were held in esteem.
Remember, John the Baptist, he is the forerunner of Jesus right in the beginning of Mark.
The prophecy says in verse 3,
The voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his path straight.
John and his disciples, by extension, they are all about seeing the Messiah come.
They all want to see this Messiah come.
The Pharisees, on the other hand, are just so smitten by the law as if the law, the Torah, the books of Moses,
Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy,
that is precise adherence to the law.
That's what's going to get us saved.
That's what's going to make us right with God.
See, both of them recognize the need for God and to be made right with him.
But both of them are going about things a bit of the wrong way.
How do we know this?
Because of what they asked Jesus about his disciples.
Why do John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?
Why aren't you doing the religious things?
Why aren't you doing the very things that we know will make us righteous and pious people?
Why aren't you practicing piety?
And the thing about Jesus is that he doesn't somehow say,
listen, you got piety all wrong.
Fasting, or you have fasting all wrong.
You're not allowed to fast.
Why would you cease from fasting?
Jesus doesn't say that at all.
He says, can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them?
And here's the little bit.
As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast.
What's implied is one day they'll be able to fast.
One day they'll be able to engage in a form of piety.
But not right now.
Now, the disciples of John, they are so concerned with religious acts, same too with the Pharisees,
that they're failing to see the whole purpose of being righteous, of piety rather.
They're failing to understand that for John's disciples,
everything that they are doing is for the purpose of the coming of the Messiah.
And he's come.
And the Pharisees are looking intently into the law and into the books of Moses,
finding ways to just please God with every last inch of their life.
And yet God is right before them.
Sometimes we can be so preoccupied, and I say this to us, to me,
with doing right things, with being a pious person,
that we fail to see the end of why we're doing that.
It's like we're being pious for the sake of being pious.
We're being righteous for the sake of being righteous.
We're doing the religious acts for the sake of just doing the religious acts.
And the danger here is that, like the Pharisees and John's disciples,
our gaze so quickly turns from God to ourselves.
Jesus.
I mean, if you take a second, take a step back,
how outrageous of a question is this?
Hey, Jesus.
Messiah.
And of course they didn't quite understand who he was,
but to ask Jesus,
why do your disciples not practice religious life the way we do?
We are the religious ones.
You see, what Jesus is doing here is he is deconstructing what true religion is about.
Because true religion, we'll see, is not about doing the outward signs for the sake of doing them in and of themselves,
but it's to draw closer to the Lord.
The end of religion, and I don't mean like the end of it, like it's going to die,
but like the very end, the telos, or the purpose of religious life,
is to know God and to be known by him.
Not to just do religious things.
You know, we have this problem in a more of a liturgical church, like an Anglican church,
where we do things like read the Bible in the midst of the congregation,
or light candles.
We actually don't really like candles,
but if that's a caricature, that helps in your mind.
Lighting candles, or certain rituals, so to speak,
that have a place that, at their best, can communicate truths to us,
but we can do them in such a way that makes us feel really good about ourselves.
Or if they're not done, it's not a real church service.
It is not a real church service unless there's candles,
or unless I'm wearing a collar, or something to that effect.
But you know, it works the same in just regular, evangelical,
non-denominational churches as well.
Well, we have this tendency as people to do religious things,
to gain God's approval, and then be really smug about it.
To do things to please Jesus, and really we're doing it to please ourselves.
And we see this in the text.
These folks are questioning Jesus,
the very person that all of their piety is supposed to lead them to,
and they're asking him,
Hey, what gives?
Why aren't you telling your people to be like us?
Their gaze is not to God, it's to the self.
Friends, where is our confidence?
Is our confidence in the Lord Jesus Christ?
Or is it in doing the religious things?
Or maybe, or maybe,
you're just not good at doing religious things,
and you're constantly in a bout of guilt
for not doing the things that you think you ought to do.
And by the way, doing religious things, it's important.
Coming to church is important.
Partaking in communion is important.
Praying is important.
Reading your Bible is important.
But those things,
those things,
can so easily become idols in and of themselves.
Things that take the place of Jesus.
The very things that we put our hope in,
our eternal hope.
It's very, very easy to take our eyes off Jesus.
It's very easy to scoff at the Pharisees
as a Pharisee yourself.
In both cases here,
a religious observance
that seeks to make one self-righteous
is the very cause of spiritual blindness.
Jesus, like I mentioned,
has no quarrels with the fasting.
And he says,
listen,
essentially,
the bridegroom is here.
And you can't,
you can't fast.
You can't do a,
kind of a penitential,
downcast thing
when it's a time of celebration.
Jesus, this is what he says.
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.
I'll pause there.
All of the Bible,
all of prophecy,
all of history is pointing to Jesus coming.
To the Messiah coming.
That God would come
and dwell amongst his people
and save them from sin
and evil and death.
And to fast during that time,
to be downcast
or to withhold something
from our lives,
rather than celebrate
the fact that God
has fulfilled his promises
and all the wrongs
would be made right.
I try to find
an illustration of this
and it really is apples and oranges
because there is no better news than this.
But imagine it's Christmas time.
Maybe you're the kid
or maybe you're thinking
about your own children.
And there's just hype
around Christmas time.
Or maybe it's a birthday
or something.
But something where
it's months out.
this child
is just so excited
and so pumped up
for Christmas time.
The excitement
is just building,
it's building,
it's building anticipation.
The night before,
okay,
it's the day of,
and
the parent says,
no,
it's chore time.
You have to do your chores.
There is no opening gifts,
there's no celebration,
there's no Santa Claus,
there's no nothing.
You have to do chores.
By the way,
you also have to clean the bathroom.
Scrub the toilet.
Imagine,
no,
it's Christmas time.
It's not the time for chores
or cleaning the toilet.
It's time to celebrate.
There's nothing wrong with chores.
There's nothing wrong,
obviously,
with cleaning the bathroom.
But it's just not the time.
It's not the place for it.
And Jesus is saying,
this is not the time to fast.
This is the time to celebrate.
All of creation,
all of the scriptures,
they have been waiting
for this moment,
and it's here.
It's here.
The good news is here.
Remember,
the good news isn't just
Jesus getting us out of hell.
It is himself.
And he is here.
It's not the time to fast.
The Messiah has come.
Everything has changed.
Nothing will be the same again.
How do we know this?
Turn with me again
in verse 21.
Jesus says this,
No one sews a piece of untrunk cloth
on an 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.
Something has changed.
Jesus has arrived.
All of the scriptures
are pointing to this time
and he's here.
And it's going to be better,
actually,
than anyone could have ever thought.
The Messiah hasn't come
just for the Jewish people,
the nation of Israel.
He's come for all mankind.
You don't have to convert
to Judaism.
You don't have to be
of a specific ethnicity.
He has come for all people
from all ethnicities.
The good news has arrived
and we are not going back
to an adherence to the law
in the same type of way.
The law is good.
It is, in many ways,
it leads to human flourishing.
King David in the Psalms
constantly is talking about
how good the law is.
The law is a beautiful thing.
But the law can't save.
It can't.
Only God himself can save.
We can't do enough pious acts
to somehow make God look down
and say,
you know what?
Sin, pious acts.
Okay, I'll let him in.
I'll let him in.
We can't do enough.
He wants perfection.
So the law is good,
but it can't save.
Only God can save.
Only he can expunge,
cleanse,
forgive.
We saw that last week.
Only he can do that.
Nothing is the same again.
You can't just say,
and this actually plays out
in the Acts of the Apostles.
You can't just say to
the non-Jewish people,
hey, listen,
you've got to keep the law.
You need to get circumcised.
You need to go to temple
all the time.
Keep the fasts.
You have to do all that.
Oh, by the way,
only then can you have faith in Jesus.
It doesn't work that way.
That would be like
sewing a new piece of cloth
onto an old, shrunken garment.
It just doesn't work.
It's incompatible.
It's like pouring wine
into a wineskin
that is old.
The wine is going to ferment.
The wineskin is going to burst.
It's not compatible.
Something new has come.
It's beautiful.
It's wonderful.
And Jesus here,
he uses the imagery
of a bridegroom.
And what's kind of interesting
in all of this
is that in verse 19,
Jesus says,
can the wedding guests fast
while the bridegroom is with them?
As long as they have
the bridegroom with them,
they cannot fast.
In verse 20,
the days will come
when the bridegroom
is taken away from them.
Then they will fast in that day.
At a wedding,
even in a wedding
in Bible times,
the bridegroom
isn't taken away.
The bridegroom shows up,
a wedding happens,
festivities happen,
and then all the other people
go away.
The bridegroom isn't taken away.
It seems bizarre.
But Jesus here
is alluding to the fact
that he will be taken away.
That he will die on the cross.
That he will be killed,
not for his own sins,
but for the sins
of everyone else,
so that if we put our faith
and hope in Christ,
we actually become
the bride of Christ.
Scriptures continue on
to talk about how
Jesus goes away,
he ascends into heaven,
and he is making a place
for us in his father's house.
He will come back
for his bride.
And then the culmination
of all of history,
all of history,
will be,
and we looked at this
in Revelations 19 last week,
will be the marriage
supper of the Lamb.
Where the bridegroom
will come back
for his bride,
and we will be
with him forever.
It's a beautiful,
beautiful picture.
And like a bride
and a bridegroom,
infidelity isn't an option.
The mistresses have to go.
You can't be married
and have someone
on the side.
You can't sew
a new piece of cloth
onto an already
shrunk garment.
And this isn't just to do
with religious Jewish people
that come to faith in Jesus
and still try to balance
this keeping the law
and keeping Jesus.
It affects us today.
What are the things
in your life
that you are
adding Jesus to?
Jesus plus
whatever.
Are you trusting in things
apart from Jesus
for salvation?
For righteousness?
For purity?
Are you trusting in
the work and labor
of your own piety?
The good deeds
you might do?
The charity work?
All really good things
but you're putting
your hope in that?
That somehow that
will justify you?
Are you doing that?
Are you putting
new wine
into an old wineskin?
It doesn't work.
It's incompatible.
Christ is calling us
to fidelity.
Complete abandonment
for Him.
And it is hard.
And in many ways
it is impossible
to do it perfectly
in this life.
But Jesus says this
and I read it already
but I'm going to come back
to it throughout
our time in Mark.
In verse 15
the time has come
and the kingdom of God
is at hand
and this is what He says
repent and believe
in the gospel.
And that repenting
and that believing
is a continual repenting
and a continual believing.
Continue to repent.
Continue to believe.
In who?
In this thing
that's going to get you
out of jail?
No, in a person.
In Jesus Christ.
We will mess up.
The history of Israel
is full of infidelity
to God.
And it's interesting
that Jesus calls Himself
the bridegroom
when the only person
in the Old Testament
in all the imagery
of the Old Testament
when it talks about
the bridegroom
is God Himself.
That God Himself
is the husband
to Israel.
That Jesus
is God.
And we will mess up
because we are fallen people
and we are growing
and growing
but we stumble.
So the Christian life
is repenting and believing.
And that's not like
repenting
and believing
to get re-saved.
It's not like that at all.
It is saying
I throw myself
at your mercy
once again.
I need your help.
Jesus, I believe.
Help my unbelief.
But that's not the only
parable Jesus uses.
He also talks about
the Sabbath.
Or this isn't the only instance
rather,
not parable.
But He also talks about
the Sabbath.
He's also questioned
about the Sabbath.
If you look with me
in Mark chapter 2
starting verse 23
it says this,
one Sabbath
Jesus was going
through the grain fields
and as Him
and His disciples
as they made their way
His disciples
began to pluck
heads of grain.
And the Pharisees
were saying to Him
look,
why are they doing
what is not lawful
on the Sabbath?
It begins
almost the exact same way.
Jesus is questioned,
His disciples are questioned
for what they are doing.
And I just,
it's a bit of an aside
but I think it is
a wonderful aside.
In both cases,
Jesus defends His disciples.
He doesn't say,
hey listen,
these guys are kind of right.
You should probably
answer for yourself.
Jesus is the one
who defends His own.
He's the one
who answers
on their behalf.
And this is what
Jesus does for us.
He defends us.
when the enemy comes,
when our own hearts come,
when the world comes
and condemns us,
says you are not,
you are not truly His.
You are a sinner.
You are full of,
you are hopeless.
He defends us.
It really is wonderful
that we don't have to
defend ourselves anymore.
And we,
and He defends us
not as somebody
who is weak
or somebody
who is somehow
equal to
the ones,
the powers
that are accusing us.
No.
We saw
in chapter 1
Jesus casting out
a demon
and it's all
the power of hell
is cast aside
by just the word
of His tongue.
There's no power
greater
than Jesus
and we can have
confidence
that if He will
defend us,
He will do it
perfectly.
This is a beautiful
picture.
When even your heart
condemns you,
He does not condemn you
if you are in Him.
These are promises,
I'm telling you,
maybe this isn't an aside,
maybe this is like
the real gusto bit,
but hold on to those
promises,
white knuckled.
Even when your own
heart condemns you,
hold on to the promises
that if you are Christ,
He will defend you
to the end.
It's a beautiful truth.
So it continues on.
Jesus talking,
defending His disciples.
In verse 25,
excuse me,
Jesus said to them,
Have you never read
what David did
when he was in need
and was hungry,
he and those with him?
How he entered
the house of God
in the time of Abiathar,
the high priest,
and he ate the bread
of the presence
which is not lawful
for any but the priest
to eat,
and also gave it
to those who were with him.
Jesus here is,
He is quoting
from 1 Samuel,
where King Saul
is on the run from Saul.
King, sorry,
King David
is on the run from Saul.
And,
and King David
is this picture
of Israel's greatest king,
and how the Messiah
would be,
he would,
he would be
in the line
of King David,
the Messiah would.
And Jesus,
what He is doing
is He is drawing
their attention
to the fact that
the law
isn't meant
to bind us
and put us
in a straitjacket
so that we
can't move,
we can't go
left or right,
we can't
do life,
we're constantly
fearful that we're
going to mess up.
The Pharisees,
like I mentioned,
they had a great love
of God
and the law,
but the problem is
their desire to keep
the law,
because that's how
they thought they'd be
made right with God,
it calcified.
It ceased being
a way to show
their love for God,
and instead,
He said,
there's a prohibition
not to boil
a kid in its mother's milk.
So let's build
a fence around that,
so people will never
ever do that.
So how are we
going to do that?
You can't eat milk
with meat.
You can't do it.
Nowhere in the Bible
does it say
don't mix milk
and meat,
but the Pharisees,
what they've done
is they built
a fence
around the commandment,
and they called
the fence
the commandment
itself,
the same authority.
So by the time
Jesus comes,
and especially
afterwards,
there's this
intense
built-up structure
of what you can
and could
and couldn't do
on the Sabbath.
Like down
to the minutiae,
and even today,
for Orthodox,
religious Jewish people,
the Sabbath
is a day
full of keeping rules.
And sure,
you can keep
the rules.
I have family,
some of you may know
I come from
a Jewish background,
and I have family members
that are deeply religious,
and it is exhausting
on the Sabbath
to be with them.
You cross the street,
you press the crosswalk button,
all of a sudden
you've broken the Sabbath.
If it rained the night before
and you walk through
the field,
it's like plowing,
and that's breaking the Sabbath.
You can't plow.
I'm not trying to be mean
or just ripping
on our religious Jewish friends,
but just to say that
if our goal
is to keep the law,
then what we'll end up doing
is we will either
give up completely
or we'll live a life
that does not look
to God himself,
but it will look
to our own ingenuity.
And this is what's
happening here.
See, what the disciples
are doing,
they're just plucking grain
on a Sabbath day.
They're going out
for a walk.
Maybe,
to the Pharisees,
they're breaking
the prohibition
to not travel
on the Sabbath
or to not reap
on the Sabbath,
but they're going
for a walk.
They're picking grain
from a piece of wheat
growing in the field.
Interestingly,
the only other bits
that talk about
plucking wheat
from the field,
it has to do
with hospitality
and charity
towards widows,
orphans,
and foreigners.
It talks about
at harvest time,
don't plow the whole field.
Don't harvest
the whole field.
Leave the edges
so that the poor people
can glean for themselves.
It's a picture
of hospitality.
It's interesting
how the law
has built into it
these beautiful
aspects of charity
and love
to the down and out.
And the Pharisees,
trying to keep
the Sabbath,
totally miss
an opportunity
to show charity
and hospitality.
They are missing it.
Instead of turning
their gaze to God,
they are turning
their gaze
on themselves,
and they are
a stumbling block.
In Matthew 23,
Jesus has this whole
series of woes
to the Pharisees
and the scribes.
If you get a chance
tonight,
give it a read.
It is scathing.
But this is what he says
in verse 23
of Matthew 23.
So Matthew 23,
23.
Woe to you,
scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites,
for you tithe
mint and dill
and cumin
and have neglected
the weightier matters
of the law,
justice,
mercy,
and faithfulness.
These you ought
to have done
without neglecting
the others.
Instead you,
this says,
sorry,
you blind guides
straining out
a gnat
and swallowing
a camel.
They fail to see
that the end
of the law,
the purpose
of the law,
the telos
of the law
is God himself,
is the Messiah,
is that God
will once again
dwell with his people
and they will dwell
with him.
Their sins
will be no more.
So much so
in this picture,
so I talked about
the bridegroom
and the end
of history
being this beautiful
picture of Jesus,
the bridegroom,
with the bride
forever.
But there's another
picture in scripture
that talks of
heaven and eternity
with God
being the Sabbath
rest of God.
That the Sabbath
was instituted
by God
not to be this
intense,
onerous day,
but a day
that is a gift,
a day of rest,
a day where
we don't have
to strive anymore
and we can recognize
that really
we can work hard
but in the end
God gives us
our bread.
And that sweetness
of that connection
with God
and rest in him,
that is another
picture of eternity.
And Jesus,
what does he say?
How does he finish
off chapter 2?
Look with me again
in verse 27.
The Sabbath
was made for man,
not man for the Sabbath.
So the Son of Man
is Lord
even of the Sabbath.
Jesus Christ
is Lord
of the Sabbath.
The only Lord
of the Sabbath
in the Bible
is God himself
because he was the one
who instituted it
and created it.
And Jesus here
is saying that he,
in fact,
is the Lord
of the Sabbath.
Again,
another declaration
that Jesus is God
and we start to see
an even bigger picture
of who this Messiah
really is.
That he,
yes,
he forgives sin
and he cleanses
the leprous man.
Yes,
he casts out demons
and he heals the sick.
But what does he,
what else does he do?
He saves us
from our own
self-righteousness.
He,
he brings us
into complete union
with him
and helps us
to enter his rest.
And these two things,
whatever you might think,
I would put to you
that this is
the deepest longing
of the human heart.
That all of our strivings,
all the people
in Canada
and in Stittsville
and in Ottawa,
wherever it may be
in Canada,
we are striving
for rest.
Not for a vacation,
but for rest.
That the striving
after money,
after fame,
after belonging,
it's exhausting.
And we want rest.
And we want it.
We still want these things.
We still want belonging.
We still want
a connection
and friendships.
But we can't do it
ourselves.
We can't.
And if you're honest
with yourself,
if I'm honest
with myself,
I'm tired of it.
I'm tired of
trying to make
things look right
and feel right.
And instead,
gaze off of me
and look to Christ.
Friends,
the great,
great truth
of our section
in Scripture today
is that we don't
have to strive
for God's
affection
and his approval
that in Christ Jesus
we have it.
We repent
and believe.
We say,
I can't
keep living
this way.
And maybe
you pray that prayer
until your dying breath.
You say it
and then you
thrust yourself
at the foot
of the cross.
I believe
helped my unbelief.
Let's stand
and pray.
Heavenly Father,
we thank you
so much
for your goodness,
your great love
for us
that we do not
have to
somehow reach
a level of piety
and righteousness
in and of ourselves
to be loved
by you,
to be called
your bride,
to enter
your rest.
Instead,
we just
cast our gaze
upon your Son
and trust in
the finished work
that he has done
on the cross
of Calvary already.
That if we are
found in him,
that we will
be assured
to have a seat
at the marriage
supper
of the bridegroom
when he
has got
his bride
and that we
will enter
his rest
forever
and ever
where strivings
cease,
where we can
exhale,
and know
sweet,
sweet forgiveness
and connection
and union
with him.
Lord,
open our eyes
to the areas
in our lives
where we are
striving,
where we
are more like
Pharisees
than we'd
like to admit.
Lord,
help us
to repent
and believe.
We pray all of this
in Christ's mighty name.
Amen.