Mark 12 (Part 6)

Introduction

If you have your bibles and I hope you do we are landing the plane of Mark 12 this morning

If you remember back to the child dedication I used the familiar example of the airline stewardess telling us to put our mask on first before we help someone else

The end of Mark 12 is the Mask you have to put on and get right if you want to thrive in this life

It is the only hope for life you can give your children or your spouse or seek out in a boyfriend or girlfriend

Of all the places Mark could go to bring this epic chapter to and end He hits us with powerful summaries we have to work to see

Mark has shown on the last tuesday of Jesus’ life the assault on him to get him killed

In each confrontation Jesus has left the bullies with bloody noses and shown us who he really is and why He came

He has answered every question in ways that no one dared ask him another

Now Mark closes with Jesus on the offensive …the Real Jesus telling What to stand for, what to watch for, and the only way to life as he is about to enter the crucible of His death on a cross

The stage is being cleared for the final act.

So we are going to see 2 things this morning: Who is Jesus to You, and It’s All of Nothing

Who is Jesus to You Mark 12:35-40

Mark 12:35–40 CSB

While Jesus was teaching in the temple, he asked, “How can the scribes say that the Messiah is the son of David? David himself says by the Holy Spirit: The Lord declared to my Lord, ‘Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet.’ David himself calls him ‘Lord.’ How, then, can he be his son?” And the large crowd was listening to him with delight. He also said in his teaching, “Beware of the scribes, who want to go around in long robes and who want greetings in the marketplaces, the best seats in the synagogues, and the places of honor at banquets. They devour widows’ houses and say long prayers just for show. These will receive harsher judgment.”

Now if you are here thinking I thought you said this was the mask I had to put on first how in the heck does this have anything to do with me parenting on a tuesday you are not alone....i thought the same thing at first glance when I studied this

But trust me its right here if we work to see it

What you do with Jesus is the most important thing you will ever do…and the right response is the greatest legacy you can leave for your children....

Belief or unbelieve is at stake and Jesus is making what it takes and what we have to fight through to get there

If they wanted a fight he is here to lay down the ultimate question..will you crown me or kill me because I am HIM

this is a theological knock out and the crowd bullied by these guys for their entire life love it

Remember the setting of the times

The jews thought the coming King promised through their hero David would be a military and political hero

Imagine centuries of occupation by foreign countries who hate your god and mock you

Expectations were at an all time high for the king to come and make Israel Great Again

There would have been make Israel great again stickers on every camel the jews rode

And these teachers had everyone following them because they taught to the immediate desire of the people to have Rome kicked out and be the cool kid table again

Jesus smokes them with their own bad teaching and bad bible reading and quotes Psalm 110:1

Here is the throat kick from Jesus …if the King to come was just a useful man like David so you could live your best life now…why did your boy David call Him his LORD?

And here is where this has everything to do with us today

Who will the Real Jesus be to you?

Is he just a useful man like us who exists to give get out of hell free cards, or be Mr. Rodgers Jesus with some life hacks, or Miracle only usefull Jesus....or is He no ordinary man…Is he God with Us…God come to save us

Mark has shown the challenges to Jesus and He is putting it all to us…Is He King come to save us from our bondage to sin and the grave…worth all of our life? or is he just a useful man who exists to simply give you the things you wanted before you met him anyway?

If you can get the answer right to who Jesus is to you you can give the only hope of life to others

And that is what is before us in Mark 12

Sure its hard to see what Psalm 110 has to do with us today….its an audience specific face kick we don’t feel

But the gauntlet to Crown Him or Kill Him is the same

And he is saying in me is the way to the life you long for I made you I love you more then you can imagine I hate what sin and death has done to this world and that is why I came

I am here to kick down the door of what has made you cry and fear and regret and wish the what if’s and take back what is mine…you are mine I will stop at nothing to get you home but i have to be more than just Mr. Rodgers Jesus to you

I have to be the King of the Cosmos to make the broken Cosmos new again

If you get the response right to this you can hold out life to the people you love

I want to hold out the real Jesus to my sons

it hit me as I wrote the dedication this week

There will be a day my son’s need dad and I won’t be here ....there will be a day when they need advice or comfort and I won’t be here

KNowing that changes what I want to give them

I want to fight to show them the real Jesus who loves them more than I do as hard as that is to imagine

I want them to be captivated by the Real Jesus not just some useflul king who exists to make life better for me

That king can’t comfort in the dark night of the soul

A useful King who is what I make him out to be cannot save me from death or give me hope that I can trust him with my sons when I am gone

Don’t you see the King who was promised is more then you can imagine but you have to answer who he is to you

I cling to the only hope in life and death and it is the real Jesus

I cling to the knowledge that when God the Father looks at me he doesn’t see my awful mistakes or my regret or my selfishness instead because I am in Christ all he sees is His righteousness in me

A build a bear Jesus who looks just like what you want Him too cannot save but there is a Jesus who can and he promises something we can only dream of…but he makes it come true

Tell me you don’t long for the real Jesus?

Tell me in your heart of hearts you don’t long for what he alone promises

This is the promise of the real Jesus …as Tim Keller said : In Christ everything sad will come untrue and will somehow be better for having once been broken

But it only comes in the way he has said it has and the way he has made it happen

Do you want a useful man or the Soul Saving King?

Do you follow a false Ted Talk Jesus or the Lamb of God who has come to wage war on all that has shattered this world?

How many of us woke up today and thought man if we could just get out from this Roman occupation we would have it made?

Any useful man Jesus will only leave the next generation just as interested in Him as we are today in Rome killing Jesus they wanted 2000 years ago

He is more then we can imagine but Who is He to You

The right answer to that is the life saving mask you have to put on

He promises awe struck hope....but it takes a radical step to grab hold of it

and its the second point today....It Is All or Nothing

It’s All or Nothing Mark 12: 41-44

Mark 12:41–44 CSB

Sitting across from the temple treasury, he watched how the crowd dropped money into the treasury. Many rich people were putting in large sums. Then a poor widow came and dropped in two tiny coins worth very little. Summoning his disciples, he said to them, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. For they all gave out of their surplus, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had—all she had to live on.”

This may seem like a sweet little exhale at the end of the raging wars of Mark 12 but don’t be misled....

The sweet little bow at the end of this carnage with the Real Jesus at the Center is about giving it all, giving total trust, and total Commitment to the King

People are coming in and giving their offerings and Jesus it sitting and can see them all of in and has the perfect angle to see

it says a widow came in among the wealthy and give 2 copper coins called leptai

The coins mentioned were worth less then our pennies are today

Jesus then brings all of Mark 12 to its climactic ending in what seems on the surface to be a nice sermon on stewardship and giving to the church...

Look at Mark 12:43-44

Mark 12:43–44 CSB

Summoning his disciples, he said to them, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. For they all gave out of their surplus, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had—all she had to live on.”

There is a theme in the Old Testament of God associating with the poor and a widow was the most vulnerable

They were the most at risk of being taken advantage of and having no one fight for them

They were the most in need and the poorest

People come by like us

When we give to church it doesn’t effect how we eat after

My tithe doesn’t make or break my vacation

We all give out of the margin on most days

But not her

The powerful climax of Mark 12 is this word Jesus uses

The greek word He uses for she put in all she had is not the word for money…it is the word for her life itself

Out of her poverty she put in her whole life everything she was and had…she believed that much

Heres why this matters to us

If I ask you what keeps you from believing in the real Jesus from part one of this message most answers would be about emperical evidence or reason or things like that ....but if we are honest the reason we don’t is because we are afraid…afraid that He calls us to lose all control over our lives

You see both sides who fight Jesus are afraid to let go

we are all too afraid to let go of control

One side is too skeptical and the other too proud to let go of control

Skepticism says I am still in control and can’t trust

Religion says I can follow the rules and be in control because I can’t trust

But if we are honest it is our won’t that keeps us from the real Jesus

There is enough evidence for the real jesus is history

There is enough reason and logic to trust Him

It is not our can’t it is our won’t when it comes down to it

Will you trust the real Jesus to save you

That is what this rare widow did

This widow is the call at the end of all the wars of Mark 12

SHe gave her life and gave up all control in trust …she had the rare courage to find true life

Will you trust Him to be who He says he is and give up control?

Will you give all of who you are …holding on to nothing else to save you or calm the regret or numb the pain or change your spouse or your kid or cure the sickness one day fully with Him in Glory....can you trust Him

Can you trust HIm with all you are because if you want the Real Jesus you have to be like the widow

You have to realize in the brokenness of life you are the most needy, you are the most vulnerable, the most desperate for Him

You have to realize you cannot save yourself and you need someone bigger then the boogy man of your life to do the unthinkable

I have to realize I am busted up and run to the Real Jesus who ran after me first

I have to be willing to let Go completely and be found in Him

How can I do that? How can I be unafraid to trust Him completely…I have to look at who He really is in the Bible

In the Old Testament God identified with the needy

In Jesus IN the New Testament He Became the most needy and vulnerable

How do I know I can trust HIm? Because I know the Cross happened

How do I know if I confess I am poor in spirit and needy He can save me

Because He became the most poor the universe will ever see stepping out of glory to be born in a food trough

Because He became the most needy crying out in thirst on the cross

Because He was beaten and torn apart on the cross

Because he took my sin in his body so God would never even know my sins name again

Because He gave up all control to be put to death by the hands he created

That is why you can trust Him…because He did that for you and He says it who He is and shown its who He is

He has shown who He is ....and He is showing us the only way to come to Him and find life…and it is in trusting HIm with all you are all of your fears, all of your doubts, all of your mistakes, all of you…because He is big enough to save

It is all or nothing with the Real Jesus ....its the all or nothing of the widow or the exhaustion of self saving of the rich

Will you trust him to make Him King and Savior of your heart and let go of the control ?

That is why the Widow is the final charge of Mark 12

In a sermon on this passage Tim Keller told the story of a French Daredevil who did a tightorope walk over Niagra falls in 1859 named Jean François Gravelet,

I am sure you are all familiar

Gravelet did a walk over the Falls 1200 feet above the waters to a crowd of 25000 people

it was a hit and his manager Harry added more crossings each week

One time he took a wheelburrow all the way accross other times he did gymnastics, one time he went on a bike

As the summer ended he needed a grand finale, so they decided he would carry a man on his shoulders all the way across the Falls on a tightrope

they offered 1000 dollars to a man who would be willing to go on His back and alot of then signed up

The widdled it down to people who would work and took them to the edge of the falls so he could show them he could do it

So he carried a 200 pound sack and came back and proved it

So down the line he asked them all “Do you believe without a doubt I can carry you accross and one by one they all said yes we beleive you can”

Then one by one he asked will you let me carry you on my back accross Niagra Falls and one by one they said not on your life

Everyone left…See the problem for us is the same …it is not our can’t it is our won’t with the real Jesus

But His manager took the all or nothing step

Harry loaded up on his back and half way it got bad....He would sway and Harry would pull the other way to counterbalance and they were about to fall

The newspapers recorded what Gravelet said to Harry as he yelled over the rushing water here is what he said

““Look up, Harry.… you are no longer Harry , you are Gravelet. Until I clear this place be a part of me, mind, body, and soul. If I sway, sway with me. Do not attempt to do any balancing yourself. If you do we will both go to our death.”

He told Him if you try to save yourself you will lose it all

That is the Real Jesus to you

He said you have to rest in me completely and trust in me completely

And Jesus says the same thing

That is what it means to be a Christian

If you get that right then you have the life everyone around you needs so desperately