Mark 2

Mark 2:1-12

THE POPULAR CHRIST Mark 2:1-12MARK is a master painter; his pictures impress the mind’s eye as deeply as do those of great artists the actual vision. The scene of this text is a familiar one to all students of Scripture. As one reads these twelve verses it is easy for him to imagine the flat-roofed house in Capernaum; the wide spreading multitude, filling, overflowing, crowding about the doors. At the outer edge four men appear, bringing one sick of the palsy; but their efforts to enter the press are in vain. After a few endeavors they betake themselves to the outer stairway, and bear their burden to the roof, tear up its covering, and ere the auditors are aware of what is happening, the sick man descends to the very feet of the Son of God. And no sooner did the cheers of the crowd excited by the unique contrivance of faith—die away, than Jesus is saying to the sick of the palsy, “Son, thy sins be forgiven thee”. “Arise, take up thy bed and walk”. And, lo, while they looked, some eloquent in denouncing the presumption of Jesus; and others curious to see if the speech will compass the strength it promises, he arises, takes up his bed and goes forth before them all. But every word-painting ought to have its purpose, and when such pictures are given by inspiration, they ought to be full of suggestion, and this one is. It presents the presence of Jesus. And if one wants to know the product of His presence, he will do well to study these twelve verses of the Word. Following out the suggestions that are most plainly evident here, what do we have? I. CHRIST’S IS ITS OWN . “It was noised abroad that He was in the house”. The one thing you cannot keep secret is the presence of the Son of God. The kings of earth, its chief men, and great men, travel at times “incognito”. That is what the papers say; that is what the purpose is. But the endeavor is never a success; their station will speak, their presence will publish itself. All their precautions to the contrary, notwithstanding, it will leak out into the streets of the little town or the great city, that ‘his worship’ is stopping there. But it is far easier for the most famed men to conceal their identity than it is to hide from human consciousness the presence of Christ. Jesus used to try that Himself. In the preceding chapter “There came a leper to Him, beseeching Him, and kneeling down to Him, and saying unto Him, If Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean. And Jesus, moved with com-passion, put forth His hand, and touched him, and saith unto him, I will; be thou clean. And as soon as He had spoken, immediately the leprosy departed from him, and he was cleansed. And He straitly charged him, and forthwith sent him away; and saith unto him, See thou say nothing to any man: but go thy way, shew thyself to the priest, and offer for thy cleansing those things which Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them. But He went out, and began to publish it much, and to blaze abroad the matter, insomuch that Jesus could no more openly enter into the city, but was without in desert places: and they came to Him from every quarter” (Mark 1:40-45). What an illustration of the publishing power of His presence—even the desert places could not hide Him. The secret leaked out—“They came to Him from every quarter”. Once, when He was departing from Tyre and Sidon, He came unto the Sea of Galilee, and they brought unto Him one that was deaf and had an impediment in His speech, and He healed him. And He charged the onlookers that they should tell no man, “but the more He charged them so much the more they published it”. And even had they not published it, somehow or other the dwellers in that vicinity would have found it out. Who can hide away the sun in the heavens? With what cover shall we conceal its face? How much more will the shining presence of the Son of God publish itself?

There are people who seem to fear that folks will never find out that Jesus dwells within them unless they tell it repeatedly and eloquently; there are preachers and churches who seem to fear that folks will never find out that Jesus is with them except they announce it in every newspaper. But the simple fact is, the more surely you have Jesus with you, the less need of a medium of advertising.

George Mueller understood this secret, and when he had thousands of children depending daily upon the beneficence of generous men, Mueller steadfastly refused to make known any of their wants to the individual or to the community. In 1847 the orphanage was passing through the severest financial straits and if there ever was a time when it seemed that good men ought to know the straits the Institution was in, it was the summer of that season. But George Mueller departed from his custom of publishing the annual report, and let the year go by without publishing any, solely because he was determined to illustrate the fact that God took care of His own; and that he did not even need to make their wants known, since God Himself knew them, and since the presence of Jesus in these very institutions would make the most effective appeal to the public. And Arthur Pierson, in his volume upon Mueller’s work, says: “Though the straits were long and trying, never was there one case of failure to receive help; never a meal time without at least a frugal meal, never a want or a crisis unmet by Di-vine supply and support”. Mr. Mueller said to Pierson later in life, “Not once, or five times, or five hundred times, but thousands of times in these threescore years, have we had in hand not enough for one more meal, either in food or in funds; but not once has God failed us; not once have we or the orphans gone hungry or lacked any good thing”.

Yet no miracle was wrought; the presence of Jesus in Mueller’s work was the sufficient publication. And just because He was there, by the still small whisper of His own Spirit, He announced abroad the need of the little ones so that from houses of the poor, and hearts of the rich, there came adequate help.

Of the early disciples the outsiders said, “They have been with Jesus”; which was only another way of saying, “Jesus is with them”. The world will hear of it if the Son of God is in your heart; if He dwells in your house; if He reigns in your church; and that heart will become more luminous; and that house the more attractive; and that church the more famed for good works, in consequence. Edward W. Moore says, “Botanists tell us that there are some trees, the spread of whose branches above ground is in exact proportion to the trend of their roots underground”. I don’t know of what trees this may be true, but of this I am sure, that our influence with our fellowmen in public will always be in exact proportion to the depth of our hidden life with God in secret. It is what we are that tells, or rather what Christ is in us. Make room for Christ in your heart, and you need not advertise it. It will be “noised that He is in the house”. II. CHRIST’S IS A . “And straightway many were gathered together, insomuch that there was no room to receive them, no, not so much as about the door”. The popularity of Jesus never waned. He had His enemies; His bitter opposers; His persecuters; and even His crucifiers, but, He had also crowds of people. Did it ever occur to you to run through one of the Gospels of the New Testament to see what it has to say upon the popularity of Jesus? Take for instance Matthew 4:25, “There followed Him great multitudes of people from Galilee, and from Decapolis, and from Jerusalem, and from Judea, and from beyond Jordan”; Matthew 8:18 : “Now when Jesus saw great multitudes about Him He gave commandment to depart unto the other side”; Matthew 9:8 : “But when the multitude saw it, they marvelled and glorified God, which had given such power unto men”; Matthew 9:33 : “And when the devil was cast out the dumb spake and the multitude marvelled”; Matthew 9:35-36 : “And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people. But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd”; Matthew 11:7 : “Jesus began to say unto the multitudes concerning John: What went ye out into the wilderness to see?” Matthew 12:15 : “But when Jesus knew it, He withdrew Himself from thence; and the great multitudes followed Him”; Matthew 13:1-2 : “The same day went Jesus out of the house, and sat by the seaside. And great multitudes were gathered together unto Him, so that He went into a ship”, etc., etc., etc., to the very end of this Gospel—for it was a multitude that arrested Him; it was a multitude that crucified Him; it was before a multitude that Pilate washed his hands.

Wherever Jesus is now the people gather. That there are churches without congregations is no sign that Jesus is waning in popularity; but, rather, the sign that He who said, “I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto Me” has not been sufficiently exalted there.

That there are denominations that are making no progress is no sign that Jesus is un-popular, but, rather, that in their planning, the Son of God has not been appointed His rightful place. His presence is no less an attractive power now than nineteen centuries gone; the Gospel is no less popular. A few years since Dr. C. B. Hulbert, then of Ohio, said, “Let Mr.

Bailey crowd a vast inclosure with the finest specimens of each variety in the animal kingdom, and, adjoining that inclosure, let Mr. Moody spread his capacious tent, standing on a dry-goods box, his audience on rough seats extemporized from a lumber yard, unaccompanied by any instrument of power, save his Bible and the Gospel Hymns, and, after a few days of competition, he will draw the multitude to him and hold them as with hooks of steel, week after week and month after month, while Mr.

Bailey in his menagerie, is left in comparative solitude”. In this world of lost men there is nothing so attractive as that Jesus of whom it is written, “He shall save His people from their sins”; and that Gospel of hope for the stained in soul and the broken in heart. There are few theaters in the country that by appealing to the natural love of the fictitious and flamboyant, and even to unholy affections, can call to their every opening, as many people as do those churches where Christ is most exalted. And if one answer this by saying that the theater crowd have to pay an admission, while the churches admit without price, I answer, ‘Its attendants willingly contribute more on the occasion of every meeting than is collected in cash at the opera house door, and they are drawn there by the attractive power of His presence, and held by the same to any sacrifice that He may require. John Watson, speaking of the popularity of Jesus, says, “This passion is placed beyond comparison, because it is independent of sight. St.

Paul denied the faith that was once dear to him, and flung away the world that was once his ambition, to welcome innumerable labors and exhaust the resources of martyrdom, for the sake of one whom he had never seen, save in mystical vision, and formerly hated unto the shedding of blood. Men were lit as torches in Nero’s garden, and women flung to the wild beasts of the amphitheater; and for what?

For a system, for a cause, for a church? They had not enough knowledge of theory to pass a Sunday School examination; they had no doctrine of the Holy Trinity, nor of the Person of Jesus, nor of His Sacrifice, nor of Grace. They died in their simplicity for Him ‘whom having not seen ye love’, and the name of the Crucified was the last word that trembled on their dying lips”. III. CHRIST’S INSURES . “He preached the Word unto them”. That was the distinguishing trait of the Master’s ministry—“He preached The Word”. When His lips were opened the faces of men were not filled by chaff blown of His breath, but the finest of the wheat—the Father’s message—fell from His lips. Oft times men talk regretfully of not having lived in the days of the great teachers, wishing that they might have heard Cicero; sat at the feet of Socrates; been instructed by Gamaliel, or heard the teachings of Savonarola. I confess to having endured a pang on the report of Spurgeon’s death. My first cry at the announcement was, “Oh, then I shall never hear him preach”. And yet, the teacher of all teachers was none of these; the preacher of preachers was another—even the Son of God.

And the wisdom of His words was in the fact that He preached the Word of God. Did you ever think of the experience of the two men, who on the clay succeeding His crucifixion, walked the way to Emmaus, a village threescore furlongs from Jerusalem; and of how it came to pass that while “they communed together, Jesus Himself drew; near and went with them”.

And, when in answer to His question, they had opened their hearts and told Him how the one who they had trusted to redeem Israel, had been crucified and buried, and how the report had been current that He was risen again, He said unto them, “Oh, fools and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken: ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to have entered into His glory? And beginning at Moses and the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself”. No wonder they said after He had vanished out of their sight, “Did not our hearts burn within us while He talked by the way, and while He opened to us the Scriptures!” The schools of life have their great text-books, but if they threw them all away, all that were purely of human invention, while they would be poor, they would not be poverty-stricken. But if you take away the text-book of the church—the Word which Jesus preached—you impoverish the world indeed, and surely effect its return to midnight darkness. The test of the modern pulpit, the test of the present and the coming church, alike, is at the point whether “The Word is preached”. When Paul wrote to Timothy “Preach the Word” he was only making another appeal for the presence of Jesus, in the life work of this loved son of the Gospel; for I tell you that where Jesus is present instruction in the Scripture is preserved. IV. CHRIST’S RESULTS IN THE OF SINNERS. “And they came unto Him, bringing one sick of the palsy, which was borne of four. And when they could not come nigh unto Him for the press, they uncovered the roof where He was: and when they had broken it up, they let down the bed wherein the sick of the palsy lay. When Jesus saw their faith, He said unto the sick of the palsy, Son, thy sins be forgiven thee. But there were certain of the scribes sitting there, and reasoning in their hearts, Why doth this man thus speak blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God only? And immediately, when Jesus perceived in His spirit that they so reasoned within themselves, He said unto them, Why reason ye these things in your hearts?

Whether is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and take up thy bed, and walk? But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (He saith to the sick of the palsy) I say unto thee, Arise, and take up thy bed, and go thy way into thine house. And immediately he arose, took up the bed, and went forth before them all”. This salvation was two-fold. It was from sin; it was from sickness—pardoned; paralysis over. Such is the two-fold work of the Son of God. He began at the foundation in His reconstruction of this man. His first speech was not, “Rise and take up thy bed and walk”, but, rather, “Son, thy sins be forgiven thee”, and the order is never inverted. It is in vain for the man remaining in sin to cry to God for salvation from sickness. Jesus esteemed the soul before the body; sanctity above physical strength. Doubtless, in this instance Jesus saw what was not apparent to others, that this palsy was the product of transgression, and the way to deliver from the fruits was to lay the ax to the root, “Son, thy sins be forgiven thee”.

No preaching that puts physical health before spiritual well-being has the sanction of the Son of God, any more than that preaching which exalts the salvation of the soul to the point where it despises the interests of the body can claim the precept of Jesus for its practice. The truth is that the Son of God is interested in the whole man, and His work is only complete when the sin is blotted out, and the last scar of it is removed from the body. As Fredrick W. Robertson has said, “Brethren, if the Gospel of our Master means anything it means this, the blotting out of sin ‘to declare His righteousness in the remission of sins that are past’ And yet, what is called in these days “The full Gospel” is only a new name for the Old Gospel—the Gospel of healing for soul and body alike. Sometime ago a man came to my study who had spent fifty years in sin. A few weeks before, while praying in penitence, he had heard Jesus say, “Thy sins which are many are forgiven you”, and his whole face was aglow.

As I listened to him talk of the marvelous grace of God that had given him the sense of pardon, I said, “This is the presence and the power of Jesus”. Long ago I went one day into an upper room, where for years a woman had been confined in her affliction.

The spine diseased, the limb shrivelled, and the endeavors of science to restore—failures. But later she walked abroad as other people, and when she told me the story of how, when all other help had failed, she turned in faith to God, and through petition and the prayer of intercession had received strength in the weaker parts and came to enjoy an energy that for years previous seemed impossible. I said, “This is the presence and the power of the Son of God”. It was no accident of Scripture that these statements are in conjunction in the Gospel: “He cast out devils, and healed all that were sick, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities and bare our sicknesses”. For, as Dr. Gordon says, “We hold that in its ultimate consequence the atonement effects the body as well as the soul of man.

Sanctity is the consummation of Christ’s redemptive work for the soul; and resurrection is the consummation of Christ’s redemptive work for the body, and these meet and are fulfilled at the coming and the Kingdom of Christ”. And the presence of Jesus may mean, yes, it ought to mean, the beginning of both.

I have recently known a perfect illustration of the truths of this Scripture. A young man whose sickness was evidently the result of his sin, found himself saved and healed at one and the same time, and attributed the latter to God as confidently as the former; knowing as well that his body had been touched as did the blind man who said, “One thing I know that whereas I was blind, now I see”. Fredrick W. Robertson, in an admirable sermon on “Christ’s Way of Dealing with Sin” based upon the instance of this morning’s text, says, “Miracles are commonly reckoned as proofs of Christ’s mission, accrediting His other truths, and making them, which would be otherwise incredible, evidently from God”. I hesitate not to say that nowhere in the New Testament are they spoken of in this way. When the Pharisees asked for evidences and signs, His reply was, “There shall no sign be given you”. So said St. Paul in his Epistle to the Corinthians— not signs, but “Christ crucified”.

He had no conception of our modern notion of miracles as things chiefly valuable because they can be collected into a portable volume of evidences to prove that God is love; that we should love one another; that He is the Father of all men. These need no proofs, they are like the sun shining by his own light. Christ’s glorious miracles were not to prove these, but that through the seen the unseen might be known; to show, as it were by specimens, the Living Power which works in ordinary as well as extraordinary cases”. V. CHRIST’S IS TO . “But there were certain of the scribes sitting there and reasoning in their hearts, Why does this man thus blaspheme? Who can forgive sins but God only?” People sometimes marvel that the Son of God should have known opposition; and more marvel that the work of God’s grace should now be stoutly opposed by any. Men have said to me, “We cannot understand these things”. And yet the Scripture upon this subject is plain—“The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him”. So Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 2:14. In his Epistle to the Romans (Romans 8:7) he further says, “The carnal mind is enmity against God”. While James asks, “Know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God?

Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God”. It is a truth that every man, in his unregeneracy, has sometime or other felt that the light of Christ’s life lays bare every evil thing, and His presence provoked enmity on that very ac-count.

Scribes, Pharisees and their sort, object to having the secret springs of life uncovered. Watson says, “The Sadducean priests accomplished His crucifixion, lest He should diminish their Temple gains; the Pharisees hated Him to death because He had exposed their hypocrisy; the foolish people turned against Him because He would not feed them with bread; Herod Antipas set Him at nought because Jesus did not play the conjuror for his amusement; Pilate sent Jesus to the cross in order to save his office; Judas Iscariot betrayed Him because he could now make no other gain of Him. There was a latent antipathy between these men and Jesus. ‘If God were your Father’, Jesus said to such men once, ‘ye would love me: for I proceed forth and came from God. Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do’. But, as Edward Moore says, “What then; shall we lose a blessing because some people do not understand it?” Shall we consent to the departure of Jesus because the Gadarene porkers are opposed to His presence? Is it not better to let swine be drowned in the depth of the sea, if by that price, sinners are saved, the insane are clothed in their right minds, the blind receive their sight, the lepers are cleansed, and the dead made to live again.

Opposition of the Pharisees, notwithstanding, this man did the sensible thing of walking on. It is the way of Christian conduct. VI. CHRIST’S IS TO THE PRAISE OF GOD. “They were all amazed, and glorified God, saying, We never saw it on this fashion” Beloved, it does not make any difference what else occurs, this thing is certain, viz., the presence of Jesus in your heart will mean the praise of God from your lips; the presence of Jesus in your house will mean the praise of God ascending from the family altar; the presence of Jesus in our church will mean the praise of God in the sacrifices of broken spirits, and in the offering of healed and consecrated hearts; even that spiritual presence of Jesus which we now invoke in prayer, if granted will prove a power providing just such praise. “Now Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour. And a certain man, lame from his mother’s womb, was carried whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful to ask alms of them that entered into the temple: Who, seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple, asked an alms. And Peter, fastening his eyes upon him with John, said, Look on us. And he gave heed unto them, expecting to receive something of them. Then Peter said, Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee; In the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk. And he took him by the right hand, and lifted him up: and immediately his feet and ankle-bones received strength.

And he leaping up stood, and walked, and entered with them into the temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God. And all the people saw him walking and praising God”. When Mr. Moody died, Dr. Dixon, speaking of the man and his mission said, “I always felt when I left Moody not like praising him, but praising God”. Who of us but understood the sentiment after leaving his presence. Did you ever stop to analyze that sentiment? Its explanation is in the solitary fact that when Moody preached, Jesus was present, and God’s praise was the natural result.

Oh, that Christ might have such place in your life and mine; that whether we live or die, His praise will be continually upon our lips and in our hearts. You may remember that in the life of John Knox there was a time when, having been taken captive, and every possible effort put forth to compel him to deny the faith in Jesus, the cruiser carried him up under the walls of dear old St. Andrews, and he, with other prisoners, recognized the beloved towers, and some were almost desperate because they were not permitted to visit there, but Knox exhorts them: “Be of good cheer, I see the steeple of that place where God first opened my mouth to His glory, and I shall not depart this life until I have glorified Him again in that same place”. If the Presbyterians are right—“that to glorify God is the chief end of man”—may we understand today that the presence of His Son Jesus with us makes this possible under all circumstances of life!