Hearers and Doers

Scripture: Mark 6:1-13

Mark 6:1–13 NRSV

1 He left that place and came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him. 2 On the sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astounded. They said, “Where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given to him? What deeds of power are being done by his hands! 3 Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. 4 Then Jesus said to them, “Prophets are not without honor, except in their hometown, and among their own kin, and in their own house.” 5 And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. 6 And he was amazed at their unbelief. Then he went about among the villages teaching. 7 He called the twelve and began to send them out two by two, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. 8 He ordered them to take nothing for their journey except a staff; no bread, no bag, no money in their belts; 9 but to wear sandals and not to put on two tunics. 10 He said to them, “Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave the place. 11 If any place will not welcome you and they refuse to hear you, as you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them.” 12 So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent. 13 They cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them.

2 Types of People

There are two types of people in the world.

When was the last time you found yourself saying that phrase? Were you getting ready to pass on a nugget of wisdom to someone? It is a divisive phrase used by many cultures to draw a line in the sand and separate themselves from others who do not share their values. Most of the time, it is used for a very specific purpose. It invites the person being spoken to cross the line and join the speaker, while at the same time, implicitly excluding those who may just be eavesdropping in on the conversation. It is a way we show our prejudices while trying to remain polite.

The problem we cannot avoid is that there are always more than two types of people. There are always exceptions. We will always miss details, perspectives, and connecting issues to any challenge we are trying to tackle. There is a deep chasm we can fall down trying to find an answer to the question Pontius Pilate asked Jesus during his trial, "What is truth?", but I have good news for you today. We don't have to go down into that pit that never ends. We can build a foundation on "this much I know to be true" and go from there. Not because it's easier. Not because it gives us self-justification for our actions. No, we can stand on the little bit that we know to be true because Jesus did it before us.

Jesus told stories that started off with "there are two types of people in the world."

Did you know that? You might recognize some of them. He told one in Matthew 25 that, in summary, said that there were two types of people in the world: Sheep people and Goat people. You might want to check that out and find out which type of person you are. My favorite one was when he told everyone that there were two types of people: Hearers and Doers. It went like this.

Matthew 21:28–31 NRSV

“What do you think? A man had two sons; he went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’ He answered, ‘I will not’; but later he changed his mind and went. The father went to the second and said the same; and he answered, ‘I go, sir’; but he did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said, “The first.” Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you.

We might be more specific and call these those who talk and those who do, but in broader terms, there are those who stop at hearing from God and those who do something about it.

Thesis: Disciple-making happens when hearers of the Word become Doers of the Word.

I Can’t Believe It!

I remember sitting down with a district superintendent when I was in college and sharing with him my call to pastoral ministry. He responded by asking me how I would feel if I was appointed to my home church.

Now, you need to know that I grew up in a town of about 1000 people. Everyone knew everyone, and my dad worked in the post office, so we really knew everyone. You could walk from one side of town to the other without any trouble. We didn't have any stoplights in town. The United Methodist Church people had known me since I was born. One of the members lived across the street from me and the choir director lived two houses away. It was really strange thinking about being sent back home as a pastor to that community.

I'm sure they would have welcomed me in. I had served in at least half of the ministry roles there in my late teenage years and have people from that church that occasionally keep up with me online. It would not have been a bad situation because they saw me slowly grow into my ministry and celebrated my launch into a bigger mission field as I headed away. In retrospect, it was not that the town was too small for me. It was that I had learned most of what I knew about Jesus from them. What else would I have to give?

That may have been what the people of Nazareth thought and felt when Jesus showed up. Unlike the slow change I experienced, he was abruptly preaching, performing miracles, casting out demons, and healing people. They couldn't wrap their minds around what their eyes showed them. "Isn't this the carpenter's son?" How is he doing this? This must be some kind of trick, I just can't figure out how he is doing it. He doesn't have the right education or experience to be preaching like this. There are two types of people in this world, those who stand up front and preach and lead, and those who don't, and this Jesus, son of Joseph, is not a preacher or a leader.

I was not the only person who went into ministry from my church. Most of our youth group found a place to serve in our church while they were still youth and they continued on after college in other churches. However, several years before I got involved serving in church at all, our pastor struck up a friendship with a man who ran the local bowling alley. He was a bit of an outsider, without the family generations from the area, and although he was well thought of, the church didn't really spare him any thoughts at all unless they wanted to take the youth group bowling.

Our pastor saw something more in him and he eventually went off to seminary and began planting churches up north. He had some incredible gifts to share, but I don't think he was ever invited to preach or to lead anything. There were two types of people in their eyes, those who are meant to preach and lead, and those who are not. I think he knew what Jesus felt like - born in Bethlehem, raised in Nazareth, sent by God.

Jesus wanted to share God’s grace with the people in Nazareth, but their expectations about who the Messiah would be and what He would look like, blocked them from doing any more than hearing God’s Word. They would not allow it to work in them enough to create faith and transform their lives.

God’s Word Working Through Us

Jesus makes a powerful case study on how to handle failure and rejection. After failure and rejection and Nazareth, his hometown, He did not retreat into the wilderness to figure out what He did wrong. He did not retaliate back against the people who rejected Him. He did not even do as we often say with pride, "pick ourselves up by our bootstraps" and jump right back in again.

No, our passage today tells us that, in the face of failure and rejection, Jesus decided it was the right time to multiply Himself. Let me tell you, it takes a firm faith in God to grow from failure to fruitfulness without going through that middle step we love to stop at called "Success". But then, would we expect any less from Jesus? Maybe not. But what about His disciples? If you just watched Jesus experience some of His first failures and rejection, would you answer His call to give up your lives and livelihoods, and go do the same thing that Jesus could not do in His hometown, and probably the hometown of some of them as well.

It's one thing to say yes to following Jesus when He is walking on water. It is quite another to say yes to following Him when He is carrying a cross.

So put that in perspective when you hear that Jesus chose these 12 to be His disciples. He had a crowd of folks to choose from initially. I'm sure a bunch of them left when the amazing miracles didn't happen in Nazareth, eliminating themselves from the roster from which Jesus had to choose. As He looked around, did He think to Himself, "There are two types of people... Hearers and Doers." He needed people that would not just hear His word, nor just repeat it back. He needed people that would ingest His Words and share them with their actions as well as their words in ways that would redefine ideas like Kindness, Gentleness, and Love. It was more than just "Preach the gospel at all times, and if necessary, use words." The specific things Jesus told them to do: preach, heal, cast out demons, were the kinds of things that people would look at and say, "Surely God is with us because no one could do that in their own power." We all need to be reminded that Jesus set the bar high for His disciples.

Having just seen Jesus falter and maybe even fail at the very thing He asked them to do, these twelve stepped up and said, with God's help we will do it.

And they did, with God's help.

They not only heard God's Word, but they also let it work through them in a way that transformed the lives of all those around them.

Do you really believe? Enough to hear and do?

The Twelve Disciples did not experience success by normal standards. Jesus told them not to go after the crowds, but to go and live with a family, as long as that family would keep them. He measured success by being faithful with a few before going after the many. We see that theme come up time and time again in His parable of the talents and even in that parable about the sheep and goats. It wasn't how many you fed that made you a sheep or goat. It was that we fed Him when He came to us as the least of these.

There are two types of people: those who are Hearers only, and those who allow God's Word to shape and empower them to become Doers... disciple-makers.

And here is the kicker: I can't tell who is who. It's not because I'm still new here. It's not because I'm a poor judge of character. It is because God in His infinite wisdom and mercy offers out that same call to discipleship again every day. Just like that parable of the two sons teaches us, all it takes is for a child of His who heard what God asked them to do, to change their mind, turn around, and choose to change from a Hearer to a Doer.

Which type of person are you choosing to be today?

Communion