Sermon Tone Analysis

Stop!

Mark 2:23-28

Grace, peace, and mercy unto you all in the name of Jesus, the Risen Christ.

Amen.

“Stop.”

I guess I first heard it as a whisper.

It’s remarkable that I ever heard it I guess.

Perhaps I didn’t want to hear it at all.

I was trying to drown out hearing it with all that I just had to get done.

“Stop.”

I was too busy to just stop.

I needed to get my seminary work done… “Stop.”

I needed to get my school work done… “Stop.”

I needed to get my sermon written for Sunday… “Stop.”

Well, here we are.

It’s Sunday.

And, I’m preaching on the Sabbath.

And, you’re here.

So, I guess I’m preaching to the choir then.

Oops

Yes, it’s Sunday.

So, why isn’t our church more full?

So, why isn’t everyone here?

Ohhhh…those people aren’t here.

Those people that are too busy.

Those people that have other things to do.

Those people who would rather go to St. Mattress than to join us at Gloria Dei.

Those people who don’t need the Sabbath.

Those people who don’t want the Sabbath.

Those people who have too much going on in their full lives than to spend an hour at church.

So, I guess I am preaching to the choir.

I mean we are here.

We are the ones who don’t mind spending an hour in church.

We are the ones who are giving up an hour for Jesus.

I mean, it’s not like we’re expected to spend two hours here.

I mean we don’t have to go to Bible study, too.

We’re here.

And we’re engaged.

It’s not like we’re wondering what we need to do the rest of the day…

Or what we have to get ready for the upcoming week…

Or what we’re going to eat for dinner and how we can possibly find time to make it…

If we’ll even have time to sit down together…

We’ve got stuff to do…

When is this sermon going to end anyways?

“Stop!”

Do you know what “Sabbath” means?

It literally means, “Stop.”

But we don’t have time to stop! “Stop.”

You see, there is nothing new under the sun.

In the second chapter of Mark, the Pharisees get upset with Jesus and His disciples over the Sabbath.

One Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and 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?”

And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God, in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?”

And he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.

So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.”

(Mark 2:23-28)

The text seems to be a bit of a reversal to our full and seemingly abundant lives today.

Some 2,000 years ago, the Pharisees were adding their man-made restrictions to the Sabbath.

They were turning the Sabbath into a burden.

They believed that man was created to honor the Sabbath.

Created.

Looking back at the magnificent and marvelous Creation that God did, He created all things.

He created man.

And, in His creation, He blesses 3 things:

He blesses the animals and says to be fruitful and multiply.

He blesses man, His prized creation, and says to be fruitful and multiply.

And, He blesses the Sabbath and made it holy.

He blessed the stopping of His creative work.

He blessed rest.

But just like the rest of His creation that was changed and cursed with the fall, in time the Sabbath was changed.

Fallen man changed the Sabbath.

Fallen man added to God’s divine law.

Fallen man made a mess of things, and made a mess of rest.

Ugh

Today is different than when Jesus and His disciples were confronted by the Pharisees.

Today we don’t seem to have a legalistic Sabbath.

Today we might wonder if there even is a Sabbath.

Too often our lives are too busy for a Sabbath rest it seems.

It’s not that we don’t love God.

We do.

Too often we just don’t know how to spend time with God.

We just don’t have time…for God…all the time.

We’ve got too much to do.

We’ve got full lives to live.

Well, just as the Pharisees tried to do more by adding to God’s divine law, we do not live more fully when we do more.

We do not live more fully when we are so busy that we do not have time for God.

We do not live more fully when we do not honor the Sabbath or when we do not embrace the Sabbath rest.

We do not live more fully when we crowd our time with our wants and squeeze out the “inconvenience” of the Sabbath rest.

You see, we have become perhaps the most emotionally exhausted, psychologically overworked, and spiritually malnourished people in history.

“Stop.”

Satan was sitting around with some of his devils and demons contemplating how to take more souls away from Jesus.

One of the devils says to Satan, “I know what we can do.

We can convince them that Jesus doesn’t exist.”

Satan replied, “No, we’ve tried that.

In the end it just doesn’t work.

At some point, they’re going to realize that there is something greater than them.”

Another one of the devils says, “How about we convince them that their sin doesn’t matter?

We can convince them that they can do whatever they want to do.” Satan replied, “Well, that’s a good start and we’ll surely win some souls that way, but too many are going to see the consequences of what they do and that might backfire.

And if that happens, they might get sorry for what they do.”

Then one of the devils said, “I have got the perfect strategy.