The Gospel of Mark 1-8
Pt 3 – Helping the Hard Hearted
By Louie Marsh, 4-21-2024
Last Slide – Elvis Quote
1) When I follow Jesus I should EXPECT opposition.
"1Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there with a withered hand. 2And they watched Jesus, to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse him." (Mark 3:1–2, ESV)
The Battle between Jesus and the Religious Establishment has already begun.
· People should always be treated as souls who Christ DIED to save.
The man with the withered hand was
A pawn in a religious/political battle for the Pharisees and Herodians
A hurting human being, made in God's image, who needed help to Jesus.
2) Jesus puts people FIRST.
"3And he said to the man with the withered hand, "Come here."" "4And he said to them, "Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?" But they were silent." (Mark 3:3-4, ESV)
Jesus puts the man front and center to force the issue, Jesus forces the issue
· That room represented all that was wrong in the WORLD.
People suffering
Leaders not caring
Leaders being cowards and hard hearted
3) Jesus GRIEVES over my hard heart.
"5And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart…(Mark 3:5a, ESV)
· Jesus is both angry and grieving for the hard-hearted leaders.
Anger –
Only wrong conceptions of both God as a person and of what holy anger really is can lead to the denial of the divine anger. The fact that even in the case of Christians anger may be a holy indignation, without sin…R. C. H. Lenski, The Interpretation of St. Mark's Gospel (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Publishing House, 1961), 135–136.
"26Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger," (Ephesians 4:26, ESV)
Grieved –
Jesus was distressed to see this πώρωσις. This word is used in Rom. 11:25 regarding Israel and really means the process by which something becomes more and more like stone; according to Armitage Robinson, in M.-M., the ancient translators and commentators described it as "obtuseness or intellectual blinding." It is the obdurate and wilful resistance of the heart to the divine truth. R. C. H. Lenski, The Interpretation of St. Mark's Gospel (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Publishing House, 1961), 136.
· A hard heart leads me into SIN.
"18They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart." (Ephesians 4:18, ESV)
· I must FIGHT to keep my heart OPEN.
"8do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness," (Hebrews 3:8, ESV)
"15See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no "root of bitterness" springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled;" (Hebrews 12:15, ESV)
4) Jesus heals in a way that does NO WORK.
"5… and said to the man, "Stretch out your hand." He stretched it out, and his hand was restored." (Mark 3:5b, ESV)
The leadership doesn't rejoice in someone being helped and healed – instead they gather together to plot the destruction of Jesus.
