Sermon for the Sixth Sunday after the Epiphany
When God Hides Behind a Tree Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ! Our Lord Jesus Christ shows pity, compassion, and mercy two times in today’s Gospel. Jesus’ first act of pity is the clearest and easiest to see. It has to do with healing that leper: “MOVED WITH PITY, He [Jesus] stretched out His and touched [the leper] and said to him, ‘Be clean.’” Our Lord’s second act of pity and mercy in today’s Gospel is not so easy to spot as the first. Nevertheless, this second act is actually greater than the first. Certainly Jesus’ second act of mercy will give you a greater blessing in your own personal life than the first. The leper could not keep his mouth shut, but “began to talk freely about it [the healing] and to spread the news.” So our Lord again acts with pity and mercy, as St. Mark tells us: “Jesus could no longer openly enter a town, but was out in desolate places.” Dear Christian friends, Here is the central thought of today’s sermon: Jesus shows you mercy and compassion in today’s Gospel by hiding behind a tree. That is to say, Jesus acts for your life and salvation staying “in desolate places,” making Himself inaccessible and hard to find. The same pity that moved Jesus to heal the leper now also moves Jesus to conceal Himself. In today’s Gospel, many people felt as though they had desperate needs that only Jesus could meet. They were “coming out to Him from every quarter” with their prayers and requests. Moved with pity—not merely for them but also for us and for all people everywhere—moved with pity, Jesus kept His band on the run. There is never a time when your Lord Jesus fails to show you His grace and mercy! There is never a time when Jesus gives you something less than the very best! There is never a time when Jesus is unmoved by pity toward us. Everything Jesus does is for our blessing. What our God gives or withholds is always good because God Himself is good. We Christians must insist and we must believe that, when Jesus hides Himself behind a tree, He hides there because we need Him hidden there. Jesus hiding in the woods probably did not feel like a very great blessing for those “people [who] were coming out to Him from every quarter.” Perhaps you can picture in your mind what the scene must have looked like: a man hacks his way through the brambles and weeds while pulling his protesting, demon-possessed brother along behind him; several people wearily struggle together as they lift their paralyzed neighbor over rocks and logs; a young widow makes very slow progress because her small children cannot keep up. They all feel desperate, but they might not all find Jesus. He was out in the desolate places, avoiding them. Jesus avoids them, but not because He feels no pity or compassion toward them. Pity and compassion for them have move Jesus to avoid them. Jesus has a much bigger picture in mind for these dear people and also for us. Jesus has something in mind for His suffering followers that they themselves cannot yet see. They can only see as far as their suffering. “People were coming out to Him from every quarter” because their hardships preoccupied their minds and dominated their lives. The people could only see as far as their own, personal suffering, and you know exactly what that is like. I know what it is like, too. When I experience my own hardships—hardships that I know are different than yours—these hardships totally occupy my mind in the same way that your hardships totally occupy your mind. · When you are in pain, all you want is for the pain to go away. · When you feel imprisoned by depression, sorrow, or grief, all you want is an escape. · When your house is in chaos, you only want peace; when your nights are sleepless, you only want rest; when your load is heavy, you only want to lay it down. The same sorts of needs and burdens that motivate your prayers are those things that also sent the people in today’s Gospel out into the wilderness, where their Lord and yours was demonstrating His pity and compassion by hiding behind a tree. We might even go so far as to say, by hiding Himself in the desolate places, Jesus has forced these people to stop focusing on their burdens and to focus their attention solely upon Him, seeking Him out! Jesus avoids them. Jesus does not avoid them because He feels no pity or compassion toward them. Jesus has a much bigger picture in mind for these dear people and also for us. In not many chapters after today’s Gospel, Jesus will attend Himself to far greater enemies than our illnesses, our afflictions, or our other hardships: · Soon after today’s Gospel Jesus will attack and destroy the very cause of our illnesses and diseases by attacking and destroying death itself. Jesus will destroy death by His own death and His subsequent resurrection. Yes, prior to today’s Gospel Jesus lifted up Simon’s mother-in-law, saving her from death (Mark 1:31). In the greater miracle of His death and resurrection, everyone gets healed and everyone will end up raised from the dead! · Also at His cross, Jesus will crust the head of our ancient enemy, the devil, and Jesus will cast out the demons once and for all. Yes, Jesus previously cast out many demons here and there throughout the region of Galilee (Mark 1:34). At the great miracle of His cross and death, Jesus deals with all the demons at once, finally making them powerless over us! · Jesus also preached the forgiveness of sins that comes to you when He gives you His kingdom. John the Baptist was the first voice in the wilderness, preaching forgiveness and life. After John was arrested, Jesus became the second voice in the wilderness, preaching the same forgiveness of sins that He would later earn for us. Yet even preaching becomes better later, after Jesus’ death and resurrection. Jesus first told His disciples that they would do greater things than He (John 14:12) and then, after His resurrection, Jesus sent preachers out into all nations. No longer was the message contained in the region of the Galilee. No longer did only the crowds who came to Jesus hear the Good News. Now you and I and people of every nation can hear and believe! All of this good work still laid ahead of Jesus in today’s Gospel. That is why He so lovingly avoided the towns, and “was out in the desolate places.” Jesus dodges and hides in today’s Gospel, because Jesus knows what is best for us and for our salvation. By not meeting the immediate needs of the crowds, but by avoiding them, Jesus again demonstrates that His thoughts are not our thoughts and His ways are not our ways (Isaiah 55:8-9). Here again is the central thought of today’s sermon: Jesus shows you mercy and compassion in today’s Gospel by hiding behind a tree. Granted, this act of mercy and compassion is not so clear and easy to recognize as His merciful act of healing the leper. Yet Jesus’ acts of hiding and evasion are acts of mercy and compassion and pity nevertheless. As I stated before, Jesus’ second, less noticeable act of mercy will give you a greater blessing in your own personal life than the first. · First, today’s Gospel gives you a good way to think about your own personal hardships and sufferings. Yes, you want to escape them. Who wouldn’t? By all means, you should and your must cry out to Jesus concerning struggles, no matter what they are. These people in today’s Gospel were that very same thing as they “were coming to Him from every quarter.” Even when they did not get their requests answered, they were still focused upon our Lord Jesus. We, too, must likewise focus continually upon Jesus, even when our prayers seem unanswered and our Lord seems to be hiding somewhere behind a tree! · The second benefit of today’s Gospel is how this Gospel keeps our attention focused upon the bigger picture. We get fixated upon the smaller problems! Jesus remains focused upon the greater issues of sin and death, forgiveness and life! Jesus will even allow His people to struggle for the short term, in order to bless them for eternity. Jesus will choose not to answer our prayers in the manner that we hope, because He wants to answer them in a much better way than we could ever imagine or expect. · The third benefit of today’s Gospel is this: that leper who was healed eventually died anyway. His flesh was certainly restored when Jesus declared, “Be clean,” but that same flesh fell apart again after the man’s family later laid him in his grave. All of the other people who were healed or exorcised in Mark chapter 1 likewise enjoyed the miracle for a limited time. Every one of them, like this leper, also eventually died. The greater miracle of Christ’s death and resurrection for your sins will never go away! Jesus hides behind a tree today so that He can hang upon a different tree tomorrow—the bloody tree of His cross. There He gives you gifts that never go away. There He forgives your sins. There He heals you for eternity. There He promises you with body that can never die. There you go, Christians: When your Lord Jesus seems to be hiding from you during the struggles of your life, go a head and let Him hide. His hiding will be a good sign to you that He has something better in mind than you could have first though or believed. _______________________________________________ Sermons mailing list [email protected] http://cat41.org/mailman/listinfo/sermons
