Further Up: Profound love of God

Introduction

Sermon series catch up: So this week and next week mark the closing of our sermon series as we look at profound love of God and profound love of people. (Show sermon graphic). Explain.

They go hand in hand because these stops are interdepedent....you do not get get to profound love of people with profound love of and for God. And yet, as we love people more we are in fact growing in our love of God.

Furthermore they are really not “stops” along the way, or seasons like the others are....I personally see them more as a way of life and a consequence of having walked through all the others to that point.

Through the stages of broken by God and surrender and submission we struggle with, and walk away from, the three S’s....Self, sin, society. preach these out a little

Barna rights about stop 9:

One of the most startling transformations evident to observers is your contentment with life. You are no longer a contestant in the rat race, always trying to get an advantage or carve your own niche in the world. Your niche has been carved for you in Heaven, and you are released from worry and anxiety on earth. This is not the same as giving up or believing in fatalism; you simply know beyond a doubt that your life is now controlled by God and you trust Him enough to believe He knows what He is doing and will take care of things if you obey His will. You are content. Temptations seem fewer in number and less appealing.

That brings us to our text today. Here we find Jesus answering all sorts of questions from all sorts of people. The Pharisees, the Jews, the Scribes; one after another are bringing these challenging words and questions to test Jesus here in Mark’s gospel. It’s like an biblical senate hearing....or I guess what it would look like if Jesus was trying to be ordained in the United Methodist Church....sorry still recovering from that process.

Most of these interactions are intense and full of vitriol. This one has a lighter tone.

Mark 12:28–34 NIV

One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” “Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.” When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions.

Pray.

I have heard this text preached on many occasions and I struggled for much of the week with where God might be leading us....until I started to really consider the scribe in the story.

In Jesus’ time scribes were more than their title would infer. They are a class of scholars at this point who teach, copy, and interpret Jewish law for the people. They had power simply by being able to read and write but later with their access to scripture and their power given by societal judgment authority. They were religious. They were religion experts.

The author of Mark’s gospel has done something intentional here. For the last several chapters Pharisees, scribes, and religious teachers were accusatory of Jesus and they did so as a people challenging Jesus. Yet, this scribe comes forward not in content but in curiosity and he comes alone.

So this scribe seeing that Jesus has given good answers thus far, he brings a big one....

the greek word for good here is Kalos....denotes whole, satisfying, correct answers…the scribe is pleased and even inspired thus far. He asks a bigger one, perhaps not to try and trap but to plumb a little deeper.

“Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”

The scribes concerned themselves with proper exposition of the law and earned a reputation as experts in its interpretation (see further on the scribes at 1:22). The rabbinic tradition counted 613 commandments in the Torah, 365 prohibitions, and 248 positive commands. Among the commandments, rabbis differentiated between what they called “heavy” and “light” commandments. The latter made less demand on one’s will or possessions, whereas heavy or weighty commandments concerned life’s uncompromising essentials. Heavy commandments were accorded utmost seriousness and, when broken, were assessed the severest penalties.

1 Edwards, J. R. (2002). The Gospel according to Mark (p. 370). Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: Eerdmans; Apollos.

Essentially, the scribe asks what is the most important? How do you sum it all up?

Jesus answers with some scripture that would be well known. He brings together two commandments from the Torah....

Deuteronomy 6:4–5 NIV

Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.

Leviticus 19:18 NIV

“ ‘Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.

Then the scribe responds with something more than approval....he essentially acknowledges something that is beyond expectation for this expert of the law.

He says yes....loving God with everything and loving neighbor…that is greater than any burnt offerings and sacrifices. This is greater than religion.

That is when Jesus gives the most peculiar response, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

I have heard so many sermons on what it means to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, strength, to love your neighbor. And we will talk about all of this but to zoom out just slightly and look at the nature of this conversation I think speaks volumes.

Why would Jesus respond in this way?

How is it that this scribe’s answer brings him close to the kingdom of God?

In this moment the scribe moves from religion to relationship

In this moment, the scribe moves from religion to relationship.

Against all that he is. Against all of his training, education, career, identity, he chooses to see relationship to God over any form of religion. Even if this move might cost him his job. The scribe, maybe for the first time, does not choose self-justification, but he chooses relationship. It is bigger than going to church, it is bigger than serving in that mission, it is bigger than being in a sunday school, it is bigger than cutting a check once a month, this might be about something more....

Hear this today: One draws near to the kingdom of God not with right answers or actions of religion but by drawing near to Jesus.

Are their any scribes in the room?

I just have to ask, are their any scribes in the room? Are there any men or women that can relate to what is happening here. Are there any people that mostly like the answers that Jesus has. That we know religion and activities. That we can even measure validity of others. Are there any others that are like the scribe....not judgmental or derogatory, but sympathetic and perhaps still waiting for just the “right answer”

Asking surface questions for soul problems.... what does it all mean Jesus?

It is about relationship more than religion. Love God, love neighbor.

Jesus is not tossing out everything else

Jesus is not saying that all of a sudden everything else does not matter. This is the rhetoric today. That Jesus just talks about love and this is the commandment we abide by. No, no, what he is saying is that they all point to this. Morality, ethics, right living, obedience to God is about loving God and loving people. This is not reducing love to some koombaya ethic, but instead saying love is the heart of all of it. Love is the heart of judgment. Yall Jesus is judging this guy even know.

Everything else falls in line with profound love of God, because we have surrendered everything to him.

What does it look like?

Marks of the new birth:

Faith, Hope and Love

Faith:

Knowing and believing that you are a child of God. This is not a “bare assent to this proposition, Jesus is the Christ, nor indeed to all the propositions contained in our creed, or in the Old and New Testament....even the devil and demons have such faith....but it is a disposition which God hath wrought in his/her heart: a sure trust and confidence in God that through the merits of Christ sins are forgiven and he is reconciled to God.” This denotes power over sin, peace.

Hope:

This is the testimony that in all things and no matter what the Spirit of God bears witness that we are the children of God and if children, then heirs and joint heirs of Christ. For yours is the kingdom.

Love:

Love of God and love of neighbor that is abounding and full.

So if you have been with us and have noted that some of this journey is difficult and hard and confusing and painful, etc. Yes but it is this journey that leads to the kingdom. To the great reward of belonging to the only one who can satisfy our soul.

Lukewarm Christianity in our midst. Reflecting on this recently with someone. That it is a difficult thing to preach God in a culture where for the most part we have a lot of stuff. For my own life it was difficult to want God when frankly I did not need him. To any of you that might be here today. Maybe your wealth is in your pocket book, or in your family, or in your career, but I ask you today....do you have the relationship? Do you know the Faith, Hope, and Love that we are talking about. If not, can you be honest and strong enough to acknowledge this deficiency? Or will it require a crisis?

It’s beautiful and frustrating that we do not know what happens with this scribe....

The story is left open ended. All we know is that he stood on the brink of something. Probably on the cusp of surrender, just before that pivotal move towards living out what he is starting to piece together.