Mark 1:29-39

Good morning. Welcome to Christ's family.

If you will please turn in your Bibles to Mark chapter 1.

Mark 1 · chapter mention

! We're going to be reading from verses 29 to 39 this morning.

!

That which can be mimicked. Obviously we're not God in the flesh.

But what can be mimicked of Christ, we ought to mimic Him as much as we can, if we abide in Him.

So, an encouragement as we study through the Gospel, both corporately and individually.

Whenever you see things of Christ's life that you can replicate, strive to do so.

Really strive to do so, because that is the command of Scripture,

and that is our great honor as Christians, is to reflect our God, Christ.

And this is a reminder of the immediate context where we've been.

Nathan, the first sermon that we preached on this series, he preached on Mark 1.1,

which is the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

And the Gospel, as he showed us there, was a reference to Isaiah 40, the coming of the King.

So, whenever we say the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God,

he's not talking about the crucifixion quite yet.

The pinnacle of the Gospel of Mark is the crucifixion of Christ, is death, burial, and resurrection.

But, thus far, we're talking about the coming Kingdom and the coming of Christ.

In the first nine chapters of Mark, Mark really desires and strives

to show us Christ as the powerful Son of God,

having authority over everything, as we're going to look at and see here in just a moment.

And in the last couple chapters, Mark really slows down,

because as everybody has pointed out when they've preached,

Mark uses the word immediately quite often to hurry the narrative along.

But, the last couple chapters are really shown,

they really show Christ as the suffering servant who dies for sins.

So, with that immediate context in mind,

let's also look at the context of this actual chapter.

Two weeks ago, Clay preached,

and he showed us Christ's absolute and total authority over man,

in that he said to the disciples,

Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.

He had authority over their will.

They obeyed, and they complied to his command.

Last week, we saw Kyle show us,

we had Kyle show us,

his absolute authority over the spiritual realm,

in that there was a demon-possessed man in the synagogue,

in that he cast the demon out,

and the demon had no choice but to obey.

Even though it wanted to rebel, obviously, as we see that,

he told it to be quiet,

and it still made a loud noise when it left.

And this week, we're going to see quite a few things.

So, let's read our text.

Mark 1, 29-39 reads as follows,

And immediately after they came out of the synagogue,

they came into the house of Simon and Andrew,

with James and John.

Now Simon's mother-in-law was lying sick with a fever,

and immediately they spoke to Jesus about her.

And he came to her and raised her up,

taking her by the hand,

and the fever left her,

and she waited on them.

When evening came, after the sun had set,

they began bringing to him all who were ill,

and those who were demon-possessed.

And the whole city had gathered at the door,

and he healed many who were ill,

with various diseases,

and cast out many demons.

And he was not permitting the demons to speak,

because they knew who he was.

In the early morning, while it was still dark,

Jesus got up, left the house,

and went away to a secluded place,

and was praying there.

Simon and his companions searched for him.

They found him and said to him,

Everyone is looking for you.

And he said to them,

Let us go somewhere else to the towns nearby,

so that I may preach the gospel there also.

For that is why I came for.

And he went into their synagogues,

through all of Galilee,

preaching and casting out the demons.

Let's pray.

Dear Heavenly Father,

we thank you for Scripture.

We thank you that you've given us

four accounts of the life of Christ,

and that we're working through one of them.

Father, I pray as we see your

just absolute sovereign authority

over all realms today,

Father,

and we see the need for prayer,

Father,

that we would be effectual hearers,

and that we do what the Word says,

Father.

As Wes just talked about,

that the miracle of hearing,

and response,

and faith would occur,

Father,

that we would have faith,

that this is the Word of God being spoken,

and that we would have repentance,

Father,

that we would conform ourselves

to what it says,

God.

Father,

Father,

we ask that you would move spirit,

if you don't move,

all is vain.

We praise you,

and we worship you,

and we pray all this in the name

and glory of Christ Jesus.

Amen.

All right.

So,

our text is broken into three paragraphs,

I'm sure in all of your Bibles,

at least it should be.

And it says,

And immediately after they came out

of the synagogue,

they came into the house of Simon

and Andrew with James and John.

So what Mark has done,

he's established that we are

in the same day as Kyle preached

about last week.

It's still the Sabbath.

Teaching had occurred,

demon had been cast out,

and then immediately

after they left the synagogue,

they went to Peter's house.

And upon going to the house,

they find out that

Peter's mother-in-law is sick,

that she has a,

Luke,

the physician records

in Luke chapter 4

Luke 4 · chapter mention

that she had a high fever,

and that she was sick

to the point where Christ

had to stand over her

because she wasn't able to sit up.

So we see that she is

severely,

severely sick

in this text.

Maybe not super severe,

we don't really know,

but the text came to indicate

that she was really sick.

And we see that Christ

has authority

over the natural realm.

Before we get there though,

in the Gospel of Luke

in the fourth chapter,

Luke the physician,

the Gospel writer,

had already told us

that up until this point,

Christ had already

performed many miracles

and healing.

So we only have

the casting out of a demon

and the calling of disciples

according to this Gospel account,

but according to the Gospel of Luke,

they had seen many,

many,

many miracles

already occur.

So,

obviously they had trust

in the authority

and the power of Christ

and His ability to do

as He pleased

in the natural realm

as well as the spiritual realm.

So,

as we've looked at,

and the emphasis

that Mark is making here

is he's wanting to show

the absolute and complete

and total authority

of who Christ is.

Like we just said,

He has authority over man

as we saw

whenever Clay preached

and He told the disciples

to come.

He has authority

over the spiritual realm,

over demons,

those who rebel against Him

from the beginning,

in that He casts them out

and they have no choice

but to obey.

And we see here

that He has authority

over the physical realm as well.

Look what happens

in verse 31 with me.

And it says,

And He came to her

and raised her up,

taking her by the hand,

and the fever left her

and she waited on them.

So Christ came,

simply takes her by the hand,

raises her up,

and she is completely healed.

I'm sure everyone in here

has had a fever

of various kinds

and whenever you have a fever,

you feel like drunk.

And even after the fever's

kind of gone

and the fever's gone down,

you still feel ill,

your body's still recuperating

and recovering.

But notice how Christ

has healed her

in such a way

that she was immediately

able to wait on them.

And the wait on them

in this context

is more than likely

that she served a Sabbath meal.

They had a special meal

on the Sabbath,

the Jews did.

And I'll remind you

that they didn't have microwaves

and freezers

and refrigerators

and ovens back then.

So it was quite an ordeal

to get fresh food

and to prepare a meal

for four burly fishermen

because we see that

Peter and his brother

and James and John

had gone in there.

So four burly fishermen,

whoever else lived in the house,

and herself.

So that was quite a meal

to prepare.

So there's a great joy

in seeing that Christ

has the authority

over the natural realm

and that he is able

to heal so much so

to the point where

there's not even

a recovery phase,

but she is immediately well,

automatically.

And something that's

really interesting

and worth noting

in the text,

I'm sorry,

in Luke chapter 4,

Luke 4 · chapter mention

is that Christ rebuked

the fever with a word

in Luke chapter 4.

Luke 4 · chapter mention

So we see then

that Christ has the authority

and power over

the natural realm,

not just in terms of

how God has blessed us today

with various types of medicines,

surgery of various sorts,

but by his word

he's able to cure.

And what's really cool

is whenever we see

the correlation here,

we see that in 115

of the Gospel of Mark

that Christ spoke

to the disciples

and told them to follow

when they did.

We see that Christ

spoke to the demon,

told him to be quiet,

and cast out,

and it was.

And we see here,

whenever we look at

the parallel accounts,

that Christ rebuked the fever

and by his word

he had absolute authority.

In the same way

that Hebrews talks about

that he sustains all things

by the word of his power,

the word of God

is powerful,

both the Bible

as well as Christ's authority.

And one thing

that we should note

from the text

that we should pull

from the disciples

seeing as we are

disciples of Christ

is the fact that

they had seen

Christ's authority,

they had seen

his ability to heal,

his ability to cast out demons.

These are miraculous things,

by the way,

I'm sure you all deduce that,

but these are really big deals.

There's things that hadn't happened

for 400 years,

more than that actually,

since the days of Elijah.

And he's speaking with authority,

and they had noticed

all these things,

and let us note

in verse 30 what it says.

It says,

Now Simon's mother-in-law

was lying sick with the fever,

and immediately

they spoke to Jesus about her.

The first thing

that disciples did

whenever they had a problem

in their life,

a situation occur,

they didn't rely on themselves

or anything like that.

They immediately went to Christ.

They went and spoke to Christ.

I'm not saying this is prayer,

because Christ was there,

so they probably spoke to him.

But we nowadays

have the gift of prayer.

And we would do well

to learn,

like the disciples did,

because of who Christ is,

because of his authority,

to immediately speak to Christ

in any temptation or trial,

whether it be sickness,

financial,

temptation,

in terms of being led to sin,

being led to,

in various ways.

So we would do well

to learn,

as the disciples did,

to look at the authority of Christ,

because he is absolutely authoritative.

He has sovereign dominion

over all the areas

that he had created,

over both man

in his own little realm,

the whole nature,

and the demonic forces.

And I've repeated this

like four times now,

because it is that significant,

that he has absolute authority

over every single realm.

And the disciples,

knowing that Christ was kind

and loving,

they came to him

knowing that he would help.

Now,

let me qualify this real fast.

We see two natures

of our Savior's office.

We see both his nature

as Savior,

in that he was kind,

and willing to help.

And we see both,

and we see also

his nature as Lord,

in that he was able to do

what he wanted to do.

So we see that

when something was brought to him,

he was kind enough

to hear their petition,

he was kind enough

to hear their request,

and to go and do it.

And he had the authority

and the absolute ability

to do it.

So,

those are the two main points

from the text.

And there's a third point,

which I think is very significant,

that we draw from verse 31.

It says,

And he came to her

and raised her up

and took her by the hand

and the fever left her

and she waited on them.

The last five words there,

and she waited on them.

What the Holy Spirit is doing

through Mark

in this gospel

is he is showing us

a proper response

to those who have been

touched by Christ,

for those who have been

moved by Christ.

It is to wait on them.

And there's two

kind of branches

within this them.

There is obviously

she waited on Christ.

In this situation,

as I said earlier,

she probably prepared

a Sabbath meal.

She probably prepared

food for them to eat

and something for them to drink

because it had been

a long day at that point.

Christ had been teaching,

casting out demons,

walking around and stuff.

So we see that

she waited on Christ

and we also see

that she waited on them,

meaning the disciples

and those who were with him.

In the same way today,

us who have been

touched by Christ,

us who have been healed,

because we've been healed

in a far greater way, beloved.

She was healed of a fever.

We had sin-sick souls.

We were dead in our sin

and our trespasses,

rebelling against God,

completely and totally

against him.

We had a malady

that wrath was due us.

The wrath of God

was to be poured upon us.

So we have a much greater healing

than she did in this scene.

We have been healed

from our sin,

both in terms of

the wrath of God

and from the bondage to it.

So if she was so eager

to wait on them

in the text as we see

that she immediately

waited on them,

should not we

who have been cured

and forgiven of so much more

seek to serve our Christ

in all ways that are possible?

Beloved,

there are many, many ways

that one serves the church.

Ms. Barbara,

I told you I was going to mention you today.

Ms. Barbara is very diligent.

If you ever show up

around like 9 o'clock

and just watch her,

she does like everything around here.

It's crazy.

It's pretty awesome.

But in all seriousness though,

there are many, many ways

that you can serve the church.

Romans 12, 6-8 reads,

Since we have gifts that defer

according to the grace given to us,

each of us is to exercise them accordingly.

If prophecy,

according to the proportion of his faith,

is service and serving,

or he who teaches and is teaching,

or he who exhorts and is exhortation,

he who gives with liberty,

he who leads with diligence,

he who shows mercy with cheerfulness.

So we see that Paul here

is saying that the Spirit gives us

many gifts in terms of

how to serve the church.

Perhaps God has given you

some of the gift of preaching.

Perhaps God has given you

some of the gift of teaching.

Perhaps God has given you

the gift of music.

Those are the more public things.

There's also the things

that no one sees.

You know, the financing that occurs

to keep everything running smoothly.

The administrative aspect

to keep everything planned.

Even things as small as

making the coffee in the morning.

All these things are done

and they bring us great fellowship.

Think about it.

The coffee seems like a small thing,

but everybody's gathered

around the coffee,

drinking it,

and enjoying fellowship.

So all these different forms of service

add to the church

in a way that God has chosen.

And an implication therein

is that if you are not serving

in a way that God has gifted you,

then the body is neglected.

The body is missing

an aspect of service

that it could have.

And that is to the detriment of the body.

But the greatest way,

and above all else,

the way that we can

serve this body,

serve the believers,

serve the church,

both visible,

which means here in this congregation,

and invisible,

meaning the whole church,

is through prayer.

It is through praying for the service,

praying for the worship,

all aspects of it.

The preaching,

that God's word would be proclaimed

through the hearing,

as we've talked about

several times already today,

that the people that are here

would respond in faith and truth

to what the text shows.

They pray for the singing aspect

and the music,

that God would be greatly glorified

through the worship of His name

and through the praise of His people.

Pray for the Lord's Supper,

that it would be the solemn

and joyful event

that it's meant to be.

Pray for one another

as we bear one another's burdens.

The greatest service

that you can do for the church

is to pray.

And that is a service

that we can all do,

that we are all gifted in.

We all have the ability

to sit down,

get on our knees,

lay down,

have a pace,

however you want to,

to pray,

and to pray for the beloved.

So,

don't tell me

that you don't have the ability.

Don't tell anybody

that you don't have the ability.

I think we're very blessed here

with a body who does serve

and serves very fervently

in a lot of ways.

And for that,

I'm very thankful.

I know Nathan is thankful.

I've heard him say it many times.

So,

but if you're not serving,

there are ways you can serve.

And I would encourage you

to seek them.

And I know we have many teams here

that do the audio,

the service,

and other stuff.

Maybe Wes can make an announcement.

I don't know.

But,

so,

okay,

so that concludes

verses 29 through 31.

We've seen that Christ

has absolute authority,

just to emphasize again,

that the disciples

had seen his absolute authority

and felt comfortable

coming to him

with their request

that they may be made known to him

and that he may do

as he pleases.

And we see also

that a proper reaction

to being touched by Christ

is to serve both him

through the work of reconciliation,

sharing Christ in the gospel,

which is not exactly

what this text says,

but it's an implication,

and also through various ways

of serving the church,

both physically and spiritually.

So,

let's look at verses 32 through 34.

It says,

when evening came,

after the sun had set,

they began bringing to him

all who were ill

and those who were demon-possessed.

And the whole city

had gathered at the door,

and he healed many who were ill

with various diseases

and cast out many demons.

And he was not permitting

the demons to speak

because they knew who he was.

So,

verse 32 starts off

with a kind of interesting phrase.

It says,

when evening came,

and after the sun had set,

they began bringing.

And the reason this was so

was because you weren't allowed

to carry anyone or anything

on the Sabbath.

In the Gospel of Luke,

in the 14th,

sorry,

the 13th chapter,

in the 14th verse,

one of the leaders of the synagogues

rebuked some Jews

who had brought someone

to be healed by Christ.

And he's saying,

there's six days

where work can be done.

Why do it on this day?

So, obviously,

the people had been taught

that doing anything

that was like that on the Sabbath

was a negative thing

that shouldn't be done.

So,

they waited until the sun

had gone down,

and the reason that was

was because the Jews

didn't understand days

as we do

from 12 a.m.

to 12 a.m.

They understood days

as from sundown to sundown.

So,

whenever the sun had went down

on the day of the Sabbath,

which would have been a Saturday,

not a Sunday,

by the way,

just so you all know

from Jewish culture,

the day would have been over.

So,

they would have been able

to freely bring people

to Christ.

And let us see

the kindness of Christ,

and once again,

the greatness and grandeur

of who He is,

in that He's able to heal

all who are brought to Him.

Mark records that

He healed many.

The Gospel of Luke

in the 4th chapter

records that He healed

each one,

indicating each

individual person.

So,

we have a Savior

who is both willing

and able to heal.

Now,

I want to make a

clarifying note here

about healing.

I'm not saying that

God heals all the time.

This is a very specific

and special time

in redemptive history

when Christ was in person

in the flesh.

What we would do wise

to learn

is that though God

can heal,

He's in no way

obligated to heal.

He heals

at His sovereign choice.

At this time,

in the Gospel,

I'm sorry,

the Gospel of Isaiah,

in the Prophet Isaiah,

we see that He had said

that Christ came

to take the infirmities

of them all,

meaning Israel.

So,

this was a very specific time

and Christ was fulfilling

a very specific role

as the Messiah

at this time period.

So,

though Christ is

and though God is

so able to heal,

and I believe

does so occasionally,

that's a whole other sermon

that can be discussed,

He is not forced,

His hand is not played

by us to do so.

So,

if you go to Christ

and pray for healing

and it doesn't come,

take comfort in knowing

that God works out

all things for the good

of those who love Him

and are called

into His purposes.

That if you are not healed,

it is for your good.

Even though it may seem

bad to you initially,

in the long run,

you can take comfort

in knowing that God,

who is infinitely wise,

infinitely knowledgeable,

knows the future

because He plans it,

has decided that it is not

good for you

to be healed

at this moment.

So,

let us observe

though Christ did here,

He is not obligated to today.

even though

many people would say

He might be.

Alright.

So,

let's move on

to the last portion

of our text.

We've kind of gone

through the first two portions

relatively quickly

because I want to spend

the most time

in the last portion.

I think that's where

the meat of what God

has for us today

is at.

And it says,

in the early morning

while it was still dark,

Jesus got up,

left the house,

and went away

to a secluded place

and was praying there.

The first thing

that Christ did

with His day,

the very first thing

that this text shows us

is that in the early morning

while it was still dark,

the KJV translated

long before dawn,

that Christ went out

and He prayed.

And what this shows us

about Christ

and His view of prayer

is that He saw it

as a priority.

He is the first thing

He wanted to do

with His day.

Before He saw the face

of any man,

before He had an encounter

with any person

or other thing,

He wanted to see His Father.

He wanted to see God the Father

and interact with Him

and be with Him.

And also,

it's really cool to see how,

as we're kind of exploring

a little bit here,

that Christ's prayer

was wedged in between

His two forms of ministry.

You know,

He was healing

and preaching the Gospel.

Oh yeah,

that's what I wanted

to point out.

Okay,

real fast,

backtrack with me

for just a moment.

This whole time,

everything that we have

been talking about,

all the healings

and miracles and whatnot,

the emphasis is found

in verse 15 of this chapter.

It says,

The time is fulfilled

and the kingdom of God

is at hand.

Repent and believe the Gospel.

So Christ's main focus

in His ministry,

as He's about to say,

and we've already read once,

was to preach the Gospel.

And all these other things

were happening

because they were foretold

that they would.

But this whole time,

while He's doing

all these things,

He has continued

to preach the Gospel.

that the kingdom of God

is at hand,

that God is literally there

at that moment

in terms of Christ

and the Carnet,

that the kingdom of God

and that the people of God

need to repent and believe.

As we've already established,

that the Gospel,

in terms of Jesus Christ

crucified,

buried,

and resurrected,

obviously not occurred

at this point.

So He was telling them

to repent,

turn from their sins,

forsake their evil,

wicked ways,

and believe unto God.

So that is the context

in which everything else

is occurring.

And we need to keep that in mind

because it shows the focus

of Christ's ministry.

And it shows the focus

when we do various kinds

of ministry,

what we will be doing

and how we should be focusing.

All right.

I don't even know

what I'm at in my notes.

I haven't been using them.

Anyways,

let's continue on

with verse 35.

Yes,

let us know,

this gives back

where we were.

He went out early

in the morning

because He saw it

as a priority in His day.

It was the very essence

of His day

to start it off that way.

He gave it the top priority

because it was first.

And also,

while it was still dark,

Jesus got up,

left the house,

and went to a secluded place.

So why did Christ

go to a secluded place?

Why did He go to be alone?

He went to be alone

because He wanted

to be alone with God.

And I know that seems

like an obvious statement

based on what the text

is saying,

but we have to take

a step back

and think about

what that really means.

He didn't desire

to be interrupted

by the distractions of men,

by the distractions

of our society.

He sought to seek God first

and for that to be

a priority in His life.

And He sought to do it wholly,

to be separated

from everybody else

and be wholly devoted

to God in this time period.

What's interesting here

in the text,

the word secluded,

that's translated right here

in verse 12

and other places

in the text,

is also the word

that is translated wilderness.

So in verse 12

where it says,

immediately the Spirit

impelled Him

to go into the wilderness,

the word wilderness there

is the same place

for secluded place here.

So if you look at a map,

which I don't expect

you all to do,

but if you look at a map,

you'll see that there are

no wilderness,

how it's generally used

to describe in Capernaum

in the immediate area.

So Jesus would have gone

a relatively good ways

away from the city

to get away

from everybody else,

to go and pray

and be alone with God

and to spend time

with the Father.

And let us also see,

wait,

whenever you look

at the rest of Scripture,

you see Christ's prayer life

continually.

Let us remember

that mark here

in these first nine chapters

and especially in chapter one

as he's continually

showed the authority

of Christ,

is showing Christ

as the God-man,

He who is powerful,

who is far more able

than we are

in our own human flesh,

in our own human selves.

And yet Christ took

the time to pray.

It was His priority

in His life.

And the lesson for us

as we looked at

1 John 2, 6,

obviously we can't replicate

the first part of the text

that we looked at.

We don't have the ability

to heal the way that Christ did.

We don't have the ability

to do all those miracles,

although Christ does do

miracles today still.

We don't have the ability

like He did.

But we can replicate

this aspect of His ministry,

of His life.

We do have the ability

to continue on in prayer

alone and making it

a priority.

So that's why

whenever we look at

what Christ is doing

here is significant

that we take note

and that we notice

what He does,

so that way we can do it too.

If Him who was perfect

sought to pray,

how much more so

do we who are imperfect

need to?

Christ had no sins

to confess,

which would take up

most of our time in prayer,

based on how sinful

we are.

He had no...

Well,

He didn't deal

with temptation

the same way

that we did,

in that we have to

bitterly seek freedom

from temptation.

If Christ,

who was God

in the flesh,

sought the face

of His Father,

probably praying

for the ministry

that occurred

the day previous,

that the word

that had been sown

would remain,

that Satan

wouldn't snatch it up

and be on good soil,

and praying for the

next day,

which was His preaching,

if He sought

so vigorously the Father

as to make it a priority

to rise early

long before the sun rose

and to go somewhere

far away from everybody else

after a long day

of ministry,

should not we as well?

You told me that...

You told me you're too busy

to really sit down

and take time to pray?

That's crazy,

because Christ was way

busy than any of us.

Look at His day.

32 through 34

is really just a summary

of a day of Christ,

that He killed many,

many people,

and that the whole town

had literally come to Him

and He healed all

who were sick

and demon-possessed.

You told me that

you are distracted?

I understand, beloved.

Whenever I seek to pray,

that's like the only time

I get text messages,

the only time I get

phone calls.

It's really strange.

People knock at the door.

I'm really tempted

to check Facebook.

And various things.

I can relate to your temptation,

but far greater,

far greater than my ability

to relate to your distraction,

your ability,

or your tendency

to be distracted

is Christ's.

Look here.

Look at us in verse...

Look at us,

with me,

in verse 36 and 37.

It says,

Simon and his companions

searched for Him.

They found Him

and said to Him,

everyone is looking for you.

Christ had taken

this great effort

to arise long before

everybody else,

so that we hopefully,

I imagine,

that He didn't want

to be seen,

gone to this far-off place

to be secluded,

to be alone with God

and to seek His face.

And then disciples,

wanting to do a good thing,

I imagine,

saying,

everybody's looking for you.

They go and distract Him.

They go and take Him away

from the Father's presence.

So, beloved,

listen,

this is really, really important.

Christ can relate

to your weakness

in this area.

Christ knows

what it feels like

to be distracted

while you seek

the Father's face.

It is no surprise to Him.

It is not something

He is unlearned in.

And let us learn

to look to the beloved,

the beloved crucified

Son of God

who is risen

and who knows

our weakness

to learn to cope

with these things.

Beloved.

Let us also note

that Christ in His flesh

did not have

infinite energy.

It was not something

that we see

continuing in the Scriptures

at moments like

when Christ says,

I thirst,

and moments like that,

that Christ did not have

infinite amount of energy

and that Christ

had had a very busy day,

far busier than

what most of us

experience on our regular day

previously.

And as we see

from the following verses

that He was going to go

and continue to do

the same thing continually.

Yet He made the time

and the priority to pray.

So, if you feel tired,

distracted,

like you don't have energy

to stay awake

and sit there,

beloved,

Christ knows how you feel.

Look to Him for guidance.

Look to Him for wisdom.

Look at His example.

In Luke 5.16 it says,

But Jesus Himself

would often slip away

to the wilderness and pray.

One of the beauties

of this text,

as a man named

Brother Paul Washer

points out in a sermon,

is that Christ slipped away

to pray in the wilderness.

And you slip away

to that which you love.

You slip away

and go off

to that which is

most cherished to you.

Maybe you slip away

to play music

or you slip away

to read a book.

Those aren't intrinsically

bad things to do,

by the way.

I'm not saying those are sin.

Those are good things to do

and God refreshes

our spirit to them.

But Christ often

slipped away to pray.

And that shows us

in the text,

Christ slipping away,

that was the most valuable

to Him,

was seeing the face

and beholding the face

of the Father in prayer.

It was the great joy

of His day.

In the context of that passage,

He had been doing

many miracles.

It says that He was

healing many lepers.

It says,

but Christ would often

slip away to pray.

So let us learn,

like our beloved did,

to slip away to God,

to make prayer a priority,

to make beholding

the face of God

such a joyous thing

in our hearts,

that we long for

to the point where,

in spite of our busy day,

in spite of our hectic schedules,

in spite of our tiredness

and all these things,

that we slip away to it.

That it becomes

our source of strength

and joy in the ministry.

Because we're all called

to the ministry

of reconciliation.

In 2 Corinthians 5,

Paul talks about

all who are born again.

And then he continues on

and he ends the passage

with a great exchange,

justification by grace

through faith.

But in between that,

he says that God

has given us

the ministry

of reconciliation.

Going out

and proclaiming to men

the good news

that Jesus Christ is Lord.

And let us learn, beloved,

as Christ did,

as he went about

this same ministry,

let us look at his example

and see how he did it.

He slipped away to pray.

And my prayer for this point

in the sermon

is that y'all really see

the value of prayer.

Because Christ did it.

Christ who was God

made a common practice of it.

If Christ,

who was God in the flesh

made a practice of it,

we ought to.

Because he is our

perfect example.

He is the captain

of our faith,

our elder brother,

who we should look after

to repeat.

And let us also note

in this text

involving Christ's ministry

and how he was,

how he worked,

how he shunned the comfort

and popularity

of the world.

His disciples walk up to him

and they say,

everyone is looking for you.

All men seek after you.

This is a great,

joyous proclamation.

It would have been so easy

to say,

I'm popular here.

I'm well received here.

I'm going to stay here,

continue preaching,

continue healing,

be loved by the people

and continue on in my ministry.

But what does Christ say?

He says,

let us go somewhere else

to towns nearby

so that I may preach

there also.

For that is what I came for.

Christ knew the work

that God had set before him

and refused to rest

in the comfort of works

already accomplished.

And I know myself,

and I'm sure many of you

can relate to me in this,

that often I find

the opposite to be true.

I find myself only referring

back to past experiences

instead of continually

pushing forward

oftentimes in the work of God.

I take comfort

in what God has already

used me for

and what God has already

done in me

rather than striving forward.

And we would do well

to learn as our Savior did

to not rest

until we have done

what God has given us to do.

And as you all know,

what God has given us to do

is the Great Commission

to go into all the nations,

all the world,

and preach Christ.

And that has not been done,

as we all know.

So let us learn,

as our Savior did here,

not to rest in the comfort

of our friends,

the comfort of those

who receive us well.

Let us continue fighting on

for the glory of God,

advancing the flag of Zion.

Let us not rest in ease

and peace

while men are out there

not worshiping God

as he ought to be worshipped,

praising the Lord

as he ought to be praised,

and they are dying

and condemned to hell as well.

We should have a burden

and urgency about us

to continue pressing on

because God deserves glory,

both being bowed to

as Lord

and being rejoiced

over as Savior.

Because Christ deserves

these things,

let us press

and press and press

and rely entirely

upon seeing the face

of the Father

in prayer as Christ did here.

Verse 39 of our text says,

And he went into their synagogues

throughout all of Galilee,

preaching and casting out

the demons.

This shows us that

what Christ had said

in verse 38,

what he came to do,

to go and preach,

he did,

and he accomplished.

It's obviously a curse

to the rest of the Gospels.

I'm not saying

at verse 39 it was done

because it wasn't.

Obviously,

we have the rest of this Gospel

in the Gospel accounts,

but it shows that

Christ continued on

and pressed on

with what he came to do.

He,

we see that Christ,

ah,

I'm trying to word this properly.

It's not in my notes.

That was a bad choice.

We see that Christ

is entirely dependent,

as we've actually covered,

and that he accomplished

what he came to do

because of the work

that he had done previously.

The power of his ministry

was in prayer.

The power of his ministry

was in prayer,

my beloved.

We are not going

to accomplish things

because of our wit,

our own ability,

or anything like that.

We will accomplish

because we behold

the face of God

and act as Christ did,

as our great brother.

So,

last page of the notes.

Good.

So,

we're at the finally

and the conclusion.

Oh,

yeah,

I remember what I was going to say now.

Sorry,

I apologize for that distraction.

But,

what Christ came to do,

he said,

was to preach the Gospel.

That was the focus

and main aspect

of his ministry.

Um,

oftentimes,

you hear about

social work these days

and social justice

is an area

that has been

often neglected

by the church,

especially among

the evangelical church.

And that's the tragedy

because God loves

social justice.

He desires for it

to be brought out

and accomplished.

But we see here

that Christ's primary ministry

was preaching the Gospel.

What Christ came to do

and what we are to push on doing

is to preach

the Gospel of Christ.

We are to love

as Christ loved,

to walk as he walked

as we looked at

that first verse

that I read,

which includes

looking after

those who are sick,

those who are destitute,

those who are poor,

unable themselves.

But his primary focus

was to preach

the Gospel

in all the places

that he was going.

For him,

it was Israel.

For us,

he has expanded it

to the whole world.

So as we go forth,

I know many of you

are called to missions.

I know many of you,

whether it be

missions overseas

or missions

in a different state

or missions down the road

or however it is

that God has called you to do,

let us not lose focus

of the main thing

in our time of going,

that we not ever see

the Gospel

as less than an end

and all these things

as a means.

Using these things

to extol God.

So,

I want to,

I want to,

we've kind of looked at

a bunch of like

spider web strings

and I want to show you

how the web actually looks

in light of the whole passage

that we've been looking at.

So we see the first

that Mark has at this point

established Christ's

absolute authority.

I hope you all

have walked away with that

because I've said it

like ten times.

So we see Christ

as absolute authority

and we see that

the disciples

were compelled

by that absolute authority

to go to Christ

and to present

their needs before Him.

That

they had comfort

knowing that Christ

would hear

and faith knowing

that He was able

to do as He pleased.

And then we see

that Christ continues on

with a really busy day

and we see an emphasis

on prayer

in that Christ prayed

and we see how Christ prayed.

We see the emphasis

of how Christ prayed

being alone

to be completely

shut off to God

and early

showing a priority.

So beloved,

what God is showing us

through Mark,

one of the many things

is the importance

of prayer

and turning to God

in all things

for ministry

and for all.

Whether it be

the ministry

of being a husband,

a father,

a son,

a daughter,

or the ministry

of preaching the gospel

to those who don't know Christ.

God is showing us

this great,

great,

great need

for prayer.

And beloved,

Hebrews 4.15

says that we do not have

a high priest

who is unable

to sympathize with us

but in all ways

was attempted

as we were

yet without sin.

And then it goes on

to say,

now let us boldly

approach the throne

of grace,

receiving grace

as it is for the need.

And beloved,

listen,

this is really important.

We see

that the emphasis

of that passage

shows us

that because of

who Christ was,

we have boldness

before the Father.

We can come

and make bold requests

of God

in our prayer,

present bold things.

That's why we have

the ability to pray

for things like revival

because Christ

is our token.

His righteousness

has paid for us.

Our union with Christ,

being one with Him,

has made the road

for us to be

at the throne room

of God.

And we have the ability,

the great and glorious,

precious ability

to walk before God,

say Father,

and present our requests

to Him

because of Christ,

because of who He is,

because of what He has done.

So let us pray boldly.

Let us pray often,

alone,

and boldly

to our God

who hears us

and graciously,

ever so graciously,

condescends

to answer our prayers.

I have a confession

to you all.

As Nathan preached

through the book of Nehemiah,

he often talked

about the value

of prayer

as we see in the book.

And I so often

found myself saying

yes and amen

in my heart,

but so little

had been changed

by hearing

what he was preaching about.

And I promise you,

until preparing

for this sermon,

God has birthed

a greater prayer life

in me

through this text

than before.

But my confession

is that

it is not enough,

brethren,

brothers and sisters,

to say yes and amen

to these truths,

to say that prayer

is important

and we need to do it

and we need to push on.

We must back

our words

with actions

because

in the letter

to Corinth,

in the first one,

Paul talks about

those who are reviling him

and he says,

well,

I will come soon

and they can have

the words

because the kingdom

of God comes

in word and deed.

So, brethren,

as we encourage

one another

to pray

and to seek

God's face,

as we say yes

and amen

to these truths

because they are

beautiful truths

found in scriptures,

the righteousness

of Christ

enabling us to pray,

let us back

our actions,

let us back

our words

with actions.

I've been doing

a lot of meditation

on Christian liberty

recently

and something

that God

has really shown me

through the meditation

and the word

is that there are

two kind of people

and James talks

about this.

There are the effectual

hearers and those

who do.

There are people

who say these things

that will say

yes and amen.

Yes,

these are true statements.

We need to pray more.

We ought to act

as Christ acted

in that way

but then nothing

changes in their lives

and I'm fearful

for that

for many of you

and for myself

above all.

Trust me.

James 3.1

says,

let not many

become teachers

for held to a higher

judgment.

So,

I fear

to sit here

and preach this to you

to say these things

to you

and then not change myself

but I fear for you also

because you have heard

the word of God

regardless of how

poorly or well

this sermon has been delivered

you have seen

that Christ prayed

made it a priority

and went to do it

by himself

and did so

for the sake

of his ministry

and if you do not

follow suit

with what Christ has done

you give an account

for it

because you have knowledge

brethren

I pray that the fear

of God

would press upon you

in that regard

and it would myself

that we would know

that God has called us

to be these kind of people

people of prayer

people that seek him

and that we would not stand

before God on judgment day

and give an account

for all the truth

we heard about prayer

all the truth

we heard about

these beautiful

glorious truths

and also

let's look at the beauty

and the truth

of who we get to pray to

we get to pray to Christ

who had absolute authority

as we've seen in this text

and over the past couple sermons

over both man

the will of man

the nature

the nature

nature

as well as the demonic world

and the spiritual realm

what a joy to bring to him

our troubles and peace

our troubles

and seek peace from him anyways

but

I want to end

with

talking to any of you

who are not in Christ

who do not know Christ

I tell you people

that

this sermon

has very little

to offer you

because God is not

obligated to hear your prayers

God is not

I mean

he knows what your prayers are

because he knows all things

but he's not obligated

to hear them

in the sense of

as a good friend

listens

to you whenever you talk

in the book of Daniel

in the 9th chapter

in the 18th verse

Daniel tells us that

he is not praying

based on his righteousness

based on his own merits

but on the great compassion

of God

and in the context

of what happens there

the next thing

that Daniel says

is forgive us

forgive us oh Lord

for our sins

he's making

he's praying

for the transgression

of his people

so

what that shows us

is that