Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Snapshot Series: "Why Do You Follow?"

Snapshot 6 3:7-21 “Why Do You Follow?”

Vrses 7-8 We see that Jesus’ popularity had spread to the surrounding regions
“When the crowd heard all that He was doing they came to Him” This is an interesting statement because we see here that people were following after Jesus because what He had to offer…in this case healing and deliverance from demons.

In this first section these people are following after because there is…
-A possibility of their immediate needs being met.

The question becomes…did these people even understand who they were following and what He really had to offer?

It makes me think of today when people come to Christians or the church for help and assistance. So many people call and ask the church for help with certain things and it is usually followed by statements like “I am going to start coming out on Sundays” or “I would like to help and give back” or “I was thinking of becoming a member” these are probably well intentioned statements but it is not what we or Jesus is looking for.

The church is here to be what Jesus calls the salt and light

Verses 9-10 show us that Jesus is not mad at the fact that their intentions are to have their immediate needs met.

At this point He is concerned for His safety and protection.

Again when we as Christians or the church are approached with need we should not be critical or mad at the peoples intentions but we should make sure that they are not going to harm us. (for the church sometimes we need to evaluate, if someone is taking advantage of us and using up all our resources and making it difficult for us to help other people as well.

Vrs 11 the irony that the demons realize who Jesus was but the people did not, they just thought He was a miracle worker and they wanted a miracle to happen to them.

We are here to help others but it should always be in the Name of the Lord Jesus because He is who they really need. We are not a social service agency. Guess what the demons would love us to have a church with only a message that says we help other people with immediate needs.

So when we do help people it is in the Name of the Lord Jesus and we do our best to spell that out.

Vrs 12 Jesus orders the demon possessed not to make Him know. It seems that He says this because it was evident the demon possessed people were not trustworthy testimonies of who Jesus was. It was bad press to have a demon running around talking about you.

But we see these people are only following after Jesus because of the possible benefit to their immediate needs.

Many people do not realize their real needs so they may follow but it is with wrong intentions or they are uninformed of the real reason to follow Jesus

Reminds me of a picture I say floating around Facebook .

Commentary of our society and what it means to follow, basically is “I check out what you are doing every once in a while and if it benefits my immediate needs I will draw closer”

If we follow because we think that we are going to get something out of it we will not follow when our expectations are not met.

The real need that everyone on the planet has is Salvation and only Jesus can meet that need. GOSPEL

But now we are going to enter into a leg of the Mark’s gospel which really challenges all of us to what true followership is all about. And we will only scratch the surface today.

At this point in the Gospel I don’t think the disciples really understood what it meant to follow Jesus, but this is the beginning for them to understanding that.

The first thing we will see is that…we follow because…
-He seeks us out. Or in this specific case He seeks them out.
Vrs 13-19

Vrs 13 “and He called to Him those whom He desired”
There is a term called “irresistible grace” that we can use here. Attributed to John Calvin’s Theology.

Irresistible Grace Expressed
The Westminster Confession of Faith expresses this doctrine by saying, "All those whom God hath predestinated unto life, and those only, he is pleased, in his appointed and accepted time, effectually to call, by his word and Spirit, out of that state of sin and death in which they are by nature, to grace and salvation by Jesus Christ; enlightening their minds spiritually and savingly to understand the things of God; taking away their heart of stone, and giving unto them an heart of flesh; renewing their wills, and by his almighty power determining them to that which is good, and effectually drawing them to Jesus Christ; yet so as they come most freely, being made willing by his grace." (Chap. X, Sect. 1)
Vrs 14-15 Notice it is Jesus the one who calls, appoints and give the authority to do His work.

Vrs 16-19 The Twelve

No one is willing to seek after God on their own Romans 3:10-12…it is a drawing of His power

We follow because He calls us to follow.

So…
How do we know we are following?
-We have the tools. Vrs 14-15
-When we realize the cost and keep following.

Verses 20-21 when you are called to follow people just don’t understand.

Matt. 13:55-56 Jesus’ brothers and sisters
In the negation form “Why do you follow?”

Vrs 21 Maybe you feel like this…because you follow Jesus you are the outcast of the family, you get mocked, you are misunderstood. The advice we can take here from Jesus is keep going, don’t be discouraged, they are blind. The comfort that we have is that Jesus was misunderstood and doubted by His own family.

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