The King and His Family

The King and His Family

Mark 3:20-35

INTRODUCTION

Good morning. Welcome to The Bridge Church. My name is Josh, I’m one of the pastors here. I’m glad to see you all here this morning as gather to read and discuss God’s word and in turn worship him.

Some of you here this morning might be new to church, so I want to extend a special welcome to you and let you know that I’m excited that you are here with us today and I pray that you would hear from God this morning as we look at scripture.

If you have your Bible go ahead and open it to the gospel of Mark. We will be in chapter 3 as we just heard read a second ago. This is an interesting passage, we’ve got Beelzebul, demons, Satan, the unforgivable sin – I mean wow this is bound to be good.

We are going to split this into three sections, which most of your bibles have structured it in three sections already, Throughout these sections Jesus is going to reveal his power as the true king and reveal who is in the family of God.

Let’s take a look at the first section: Jesus receives accusations.

Verse 20

20And He camehome, and thecrowd gathered again,to such an extent that they could not even eata meal.21WhenHis ownpeople heardof this, they went out to take custody of Him; for they were saying, “He has lost His senses.”

Now, imagine this with me…you’ve had a long day at work. Let’s just say it’s a Monday because we all know Mondays are just the worst right? So it’s Monday evening, you finally get home after dealing with people all day long. You walk into your house and all you want to do is sit down and then eat dinner. So you walk in begin to sit down and suddenly you hear the murmur of people. You don’t think anything of it at first, but then the murmurs get louder and some turn into shouts. You look out of your window and there are hundreds of people surrounding your house. So much for your peaceful evening at home eating dinner!

Jesus has been traveling, he’s been healing people of their physical ailments, their spiritual ailment, and he’s been casting out demons. He’s been preaching to massive crowds of people and he’s just been up on a mountain with his twelve disciples. He comes down from the mountain and enters a home to put his feet up, take a second, rest and eat. As he sits down he hears the crowd of people gathering outside the house. He can’t even sit down and eat because the crowd of people gathered around his house.

Then, Jesus’ own family hear of what is happening and so they set out to go get Jesus, grab him and pull him away. Our text says to take custody of or seize him. This is the same word that is used to mean arrest, the very one that is used later when they come to arrest Jesus in the garden. His family has purposed to take ahold of him even if that means dragging him back.

Perhaps there’s some sympathy that is driving his family to do this. Like when you get sick and your mom tends to your needs and tells everyone else to leave you alone.

But, Jesus’ family heard the reports of all that was going on. They were likely aware of why the crowds were gathering. Jesus had been healing people and performing exorcisms. When you do things like this, there are going to be people that think you’ve gone crazy. His family comes to take him away saying that Jesus has lost his mind. Jesus has lost his senses. He’s not even concerned that he doesn’t have time to eat because of all these people that keep bugging him. So they come to get him as they think he’s gone mad.

His family doesn’t understand fully who Jesus is and what he has come to do and so they accuse him of losing his mind. That’s the first accusation Jesus receives, the next accusations we will see in…

Verse 22

22The scribes who came downfrom Jerusalem were saying, “He is possessed byBeelzebul,” and “He casts out the demons by the ruler of the demons.”

So his family thinks that he’s gone crazy, then the scribes or as some call them, the teachers of the law come down from Jerusalem and make two much more heinous accusations.

The first, is that the scribes say that Jesus is possessed by a demon named Beelzebul or Beelzebub depending on your translation.

There’s not much known about Beelzebul. The name is not found in any other Jewish writings. Some believe that it is the name of a specific demon, others believe that it is another name for Satan. The name is derived from two words in Hebrew, the first is “Baal” which is translated as “lord” and is the name of the false god that is seen in the Old Testament. The other is “zebul” translated as “house.” Essentially, Beelzebul is the “lord of the house” or the “master of the house,” which is why many believe that this is another name for Satan.

Whether or not Beelzebul is a separate demon or if it is synonymous with “Satan,” the accusation remains the same…The scribes say that Jesus is possessed. In verse 30 this sentiment is reiterated when Mark states, “they were saying he has an unclean spirit.”

The second accusation by the scribes is that Jesus is conspiring with Satan. They say that Jesus is knowingly collaborating with Satan. Essentially, Jesus “casts out demons by means of the power he has from the devil.”

As you read this, some of you are thinking, “man those dumb scribes had it all wrong.”[i] I know that is often my first inclination when I read passages like this. But then, the Holy Spirit smacks me across the face and reminds me that I often think like one of the scribes.

Take a second and think about this. You hear that some guy is drawing up crowds of people and that supposedly people are being healed of their physical ailments and that he is casting out demons. Never before have you seen somebody exhibit such power especially over demons. Then you think, well who is it that would have power over the demons. Satan would. Satan is the one in charge of his demons. Logically, it would seem that we must conclude that for one to have power over the demons then they must either be Satan himself or someone who is in league with Satan.

These aren’t ignorant men who are just throwing out silly accusations. These are schooled, intelligent teachers of the law.

This scares me a little bit. You know why? Because I’m a schooled, somewhat intelligent, teacher. I process things in a very similar fashion to the way the scribes would. It scares me because I might have been one of the guys that missed who Jesus was. It scares me because it might mean that I sometimes miss what Jesus is doing around me.

It scares me even more because of what that means for many people who think of themselves as being so intelligent that they can explain away any need for God.

Here’s the reality as one commentator says it, “Intellectual grasp and academic ability are not of themselves signs of saving faith.”[ii]

I’ll put it this way:

Gospel articulation does not equal saving faith.

Increasing ability of gospel articulation does not equal a closer walk with God

Just because you’re schooled or intelligent or let’s even say just because you’ve gone to seminary…that does not prove your faith. Just because you can talk about the bible or the history of it or rattle off all these facts doesn’t mean that you have a closer walk with God than the person who just became a believer. (this is a correction to me personally a correction to my own mindset.)

Jesus died on the cross in your place so that you could be saved. Every day the way that you demonstrate your faith and the way that you walk closely with God is by reminding yourself of that truth. Reminding yourself that there was nothing you could do, Ephesians 2 – you were dead, but God in his great love and mercy sent his son, Jesus to stand in your place, to take your sin upon the cross, to die your death and be buried into your grave and to then conquer it by raising and ascending to his throne.

Here’s what else we see from this first section…

When it comes to Jesus, neutrality is not an option

Like Tom Brady, one of if not the best quarterback in NFL history. People either love him and the Patriots for that matter or they hate em. There’s no neutrality.

As people see and hear what Jesus has been doing there are a few options, none of which are remaining neutral.

One commentator says it this way, “To see and hear Jesus was to put oneself into the dangerous situation of having to choose.”[iii]

Sitting here today and listening to God’s word and hearing what it says about Jesus means that you have a choice to make. You cannot remain neutral with Jesus. Some have tried to argue against Christianity and in their arguments they concede to historical evidence that Jesus was a real person, but then they simply liken him to a good moral teacher or just another religious leader.

Here’s the major problem with that put well by C.S. Lewis, “[Jesus] was never regarded as a mere moral teacher. He did not produce that effect on any of the people who actually met him. He produced mainly three effects — Hatred — Terror — Adoration. There was no trace of people expressing mild approval.”[iv]

This is similar to one of Lewis’ other quotes from Mere Christianity:

“A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”[v]

Jesus’ family thought he was crazy…a lunatic. The scribes thought he was the devil...a liar. Many would come to know him as Lord. Who is it that you say Jesus is?

Take a second and think about that as I pray…

Now let’s take a look at the second section: Jesus responds to accusations

Verse 23

23And He called them to Himself and began speaking to them inparables,“How canSatan cast out Satan?24If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.25If a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.26IfSatan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, buthe is finished!

Two ways a kingdom or a group or a house can fall: from an outside attack or from division within. In this section Jesus is referring to the latter. He’s breaking down their argument by using an analogy.

He’s says, “look, if I was Satan, why would I be casting out my own soldiers?” It doesn’t make any sense if he’s truly cooperating with Satan that Jesus would be casting out his own coworkers. This would essentially be a civil war. When a civil war breaks out, there’s no more united kingdom or group of people. There is now division and a struggle for power.

A divided house is just that, divided. There is no family unity when the family breaks apart, it cannot stand. Jesus says simply, that if Satan and his kingdom were divided then it would be Satan’s demise, his end, he would be finished. And Jesus says that is not what is happening. Satan has more sense than to divide his own kingdom. Unfortunately, he is much craftier than that. He has set out to steal, kill, and destroy, and he is still doing that.

Jesus makes it clear that it is not by the power of Satan that demons are being cast out, but that it is by an altogether different power, by a different and truer king.

He uses this next part of the analogy to drive that home.

Verse 27

27But no one can enter the strong man’s house and plunder his property unless he first binds the strong man, and then he will plunder his house.

An internal revolution is not the only way to overthrow a regime. There is another option. Jesus begins to explain to them that there is another way to overthrow a power. That way is by an outside attack. An invasion so to speak. An outside power that is stronger than the current power comes in and takes over.

Jesus is saying that Satan, as is made clear throughout other passages, has power here on this earth, but that Satan’s power is not the ultimate power. There is a greater power that can bind and destroy Satan’s power. This is the power that Jesus has and this is what he plans to do.

The problem the scribes had is that they couldn’t perceive any other options for Jesus. They thought he was possessed and was conspiring with Satan. They couldn’t see beyond their own logic. They were stuck in their minds. The option for Jesus to be a greater power, one that had true authority over all things was inconceivable for them. They didn’t leave that as an option in their minds.

Jesus was casting out demons; therefore, he must either be on the same team as or himself be the devil. Jesus being the one true God in the flesh wasn’t a category they had available to them.

Jesus uses this analogy as a way to begin to portray that “Satan’s rule was…crumbling, not because Satan was divided against himself, but because he [was being] overcome by someone stronger.”[vi]

Jesus plans to forever bind Satan. Jesus is the stronger man that will come in and tie up Satan. Not only does he plan to bind him but also he plans to one-day forever cast him into a pit and at that point Satan will be left completely powerless.

Here’s what we need to understand Satan is a defeated foe, but he is not a powerless one yet. [vii]

The key word for us to focus on is the final word, “yet.” Satan is defeated but he is not yet powerless. Jesus has defeated him and we know the final outcome; however, he has not yet left him powerless here on this earth. Satan still has the ability to cause havoc and pain here.