Simply Jesus | Deep and Wide Impact - Fr. Aaron Damiani

The Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

According to Mark, Jesus withdrew with his disciples to

the sea, and a great crowd followed from Galilee and Judea

and Jerusalem and Idumea, and from beyond the Jordan and from

around Tyler and Sidon. And when the And when the great

crowd heard of all that he was doing, they came to him, and he

told his disciples to have a boat ready for him because of

the crowd, lest they crush him. For he had healed many, so that

all who had diseases pressed around him to touch him.

And whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they fell down before

him and cried out. You are the Son of God.

And he strictly ordered them not to make him known.

And he went up on the mountain, and called to him those whom he

desired, and they came to him. And he appointed 12 whom he also

named apostles, so that they might be with him, and he might

send them out to preach and have authority to cast out demons.

He appointed the 12 Simon to him.

He gave the name Peter, James the son of Zebedee, and John the

brother of James, to whom he gave the name Bouana.

Guess that is son of Thunder, Andrew and Philip and

Bartholomew and Matthew and Thomas and James, the son of

Alphias and Thaddeus and Simon the Canonian and Judas Iscariot

who betrayed him the Gospel of the Lord.

Would you pray with me? Lord, we open our hearts to you.

As those early disciples followed you, Lord, let us also

follow you. I pray, Lord, that you would put

us in a community of grace where we can be rightly challenged and

invited further up and further in to become like you, to become

friends with you, and also to share in your holy and good

work. We pray this in the name of

Jesus, Amen. Well, please be seated and you

can turn your your Bibles or your bulletins to mark chapter 3

Mark 3 · chapter mention

as we continue our series. Simply Jesus.

Well, my first few experiences of Chicago were as a tourist was

years ago. And I wonder if you could guess

some of the places that I went to experience Chicago.

Yeah, Navy Pier, which is classic mistake.

I didn't know any better. You probably didn't know any

better either when you first went there.

Giordano's. I didn't know.

I went to Ed to Bevic's. You know, where they insult you

and I this. I thought this is Chicago.

The Sears Tower. Still called Sears Tower, the

observatory there, if the bean had existed at that time,

probably would have gotten a picture with friends and it

would have been my Chicago experience.

I did get it. It was, it was Chicago.

It was a taste of it. It was an experience of it.

Kind of on the surface I was a tourist, but I had not yet

become a neighbor. Becoming a neighbor here was a

much longer process. It was a bigger commitment.

It was it was days and years and weeks and a long process, not

just moments. Becoming a Chicago neighbor,

what does that mean? What did that mean?

It means shoveling the sidewalk on a morning like this in the

winter and then in the summer. It means bringing a side dish to

your neighborhood block party. And it means finding and

supporting the offbeat restaurants and grocery stores.

And it means learning how to drive with the perfect blend of

like, you know, kindness and aggression.

You know, you have to learn this over time.

It's not just sampling the city, but actually learning how to

serve the city. And in Mark's gospel, he's going

to show us two different ways of responding positively to Jesus.

And one really is at that tourist level, there's these

crowds that show up for an experience of Jesus, a touch

point, a taste, and that is positive.

Yet a lot of people get stuck there.

That's their, that's their, that's their experience of

Christianity. It's on the tourist level.

But the adventure really begins in the second-half of the text

here, which is the neighbor level, where Jesus calls us to

be with him, to be friends with him and, and to share deeply in

his life and to to let him shape us over a long period of time

until he can entrust his Kingdom to us.

And Mark Fried, we're going to see that Jesus heals the crowds,

but he forms the disciples. And Jesus is always inviting us

to go beyond the crowd level into the discipleship level.

Not every Chicago tourist should become a Chicago neighbor, but

everyone who experiences any good positive touch point with

Jesus is invited to be shaped by him into discipleship.

And I just want to be clear that today all of us are invited up

the mountain to the level of discipleship formation in Jesus.

We'll talk a little bit about what that might mean for us, but

before we do, let's consider that first group, the crowds.

And as we look at verses 7 and 8 of Mark chapter 3, I want you to

Mark 3 · chapter mention

just take special notice of all of the uses of the Word.

And can you notice all of the uses of the Word?

And in verses 7 and 8, Jesus withdrew with his disciples to

the sea. This is the Sea of Galilee.

This is his base of operations in the center, as it were of his

popularity. He withdrew with his disciples

to the sea and a great crowd followed.

This is a very unique word for crowd in Mark's Gospel.

This is the highest and and most populated sort of word that he

could use for the number of people.

And they went from from Galilee, which is up north to Judea,

which is an entire region in the South in which Jerusalem is, is

housed. So Galilee and Judea, verse 8

and Jerusalem and Idumea and from beyond the Jordan and from

around Tyre and Sinon. So some of the northwest sort of

communities are, are, are traveling.

And so some of you here, you're familiar with the geography of

Palestine and you know, like this is a massive area,

especially where there's no like cars, there's there's nothing

but traveling on foot or traveling via animal.

This is a massive crowd. This is a very diverse crowd as

well. They're North and South and NW

diverse backgrounds, walks of life.

There are thousands and thousands of people all

converging around one person. They all want to get to 1

person. Why?

Well, Mark says when the great crowd heard all that he was

doing, all that Jesus was doing, they came to him.

When they heard what he was doing, they, they came to him.

And what they were hearing about him was that he was healing

people with all kinds of sicknesses.

And he was also setting people free from, from all kinds of

unclean spirits, otherwise known as demons who were, who were

tormenting people. And these two realities were

constant deep pain points for people in that day.

There was no modern medicine at that time.

Life expectancy right now in the year 2026 in the US is around 78

years old. In the time of Jesus's day, it

was between 20 and 40 years old, brought down especially by

infant mortality. But there was a lot of people

who are just, you know, from young to old, extraordinarily

sick and suffering and from every different level.

You have spiritual, you have psychological, you have psych,

psychiatric, you have physical. And what's happening is Jesus is

restoring people into wholeness and he's setting them free.

And if you or I were living at that time, and if you or I had

any kind of like physical, psychiatric, spiritual, sort of

death is taking over us and we could get to Jesus, we'd be in

this this crowd, You know, if we had any way of getting healing,

we would get there to we would want to converge on this one

man. Pain points of life get us

moving somewhere. We want change.

Things can't stay the same. And I would say that the pain

points of human existence is one of the reasons why people turn

to spirituality and religion. And it's one of the reasons why

people turn to Jesus and they begin to pray and they begin to

consider whether or not God could do something for them

through Christ. These people want relief and you

know, you don't see Jesus in this text responding to the

demands with a criticism. He doesn't say you shallow

consumers, what are you doing here?

All you care about is your healing.

The fact is that Jesus came for them.

He he makes space for them. Verse 9 shows us the

accommodations that he makes for them.

And he, Jesus told his disciples to have a boat ready for him

because of the crowd, lest they crush him.

You can imagine right off of the like little tiny lapping waves

on the Sea of Galilee, about maybe 10 feet off or so, 15 feet

off, there's a fishing boat, maybe one of the fishing boats

that Jesus's disciples would use for the fishing excursions.

And now it's repurposed as a healing station.

And Jesus sets up on the boat, maybe with a, a space for 1/2 a

dozen people or so to, to be around him.

Maybe folks to, you know, help carry people on the boat and and

hold them as Jesus is performing healings and delivering them

from unclean spirits. The water forms a bit of a Moat

so the crowds can't just crush on to Jesus.

They have to maybe form a line. Perhaps we don't know, but

perhaps they form some kind of a line.

And I don't like it's like Midway airport.

People are like cutting in line or something like that.

But but they make their way through the waters and they get

up on the boat and there's a lot of intensity there.

Verse 10, they're, they're pressing around to touch Jesus,

they're trying to touch him. And we just imagine like there's

a, there's a lot of energy here. There's a lot of intensity here.

If if any of you've been in a crowded situation where everyone

wants the same thing, maybe it's a concert, maybe it's Black

Friday shopping, we don't know, a limited edition item.

Everyone wants that. It's not the most personal

tender kind of a moment. It's it's real pushy.

It's real Chevy and you need some crowd control.

It's worth saying that there's something transactional about

these crowds. They want to touch Jesus almost

like he's a magician with special powers that they can

access. They want a touch point from the

Lord, not necessarily an imprint.

And those two things are different.

Something on the surface they want to change, something

physical they a pain they want to go away, something spiritual

they want to change. That goes a little bit deeper,

But they want a touch point, not an imprint per SE.

That choice will come later. Jesus nevertheless gives them

what they saw at verse 10. He had healed many.

He healed many and just imagined the thousands of people getting

healed at all the different levels that you can imagine, the

sicknesses they brought, wholeness, people walking in

freedom, people crying tears of joy for the first time,

thousands of people getting a touch from Jesus.

And it was especially for them. It was kind of a resurrection of

life. We can imagine it.

People jumping out of the boat where Jesus healed them,

swimming to shore, shaking the water out of their hair, crying

for joy for the first time, dancing with their friends.

A woman limping in pain now dancing with her friends.

Or what about a child who couldn't speak after he is

healed by Jesus? He's laughing with his parents.

His parents are throwing him in the air.

Or troubled man who hasn't slept a full night's sleep in years.

Finally, that very night after the touch from Jesus, he sleeps

for 10 hours without any torment, waking him up in the

middle of the night and his life has changed forever.

And imagine being a part of this and seeing this like thousands,

maybe 10s of thousands of people just changed and healed.

Earlier on in Mark's gospel, there was an all night healing

service at Peter's mother in law's house.

The whole village came from all the way from sundown all the way

to sun up. It's like the new dawn of the

Kingdom of God is coming. What it like?

We would never forget this moment.

We would not want to ever forget this moment.

Jesus wouldn't want us to forget this moment, this era where the

healing king has come and God's Kingdom is here and darkness is

getting rolled back and everything in us would want to

just bottle it up and be like, let's just stay here.

Let's just keep this rolling. Let's invite the whole world.

Jesus was here for it. Jesus is still here for it

because he loves saving people. He loves helping people.

So what are the pain points, friends, that are bringing us to

Jesus? What are the pain points that

get us like praying again with passion, like putting skin in

the game with God? What longings got us here this

morning? I mean, it's like how cold is it

out there? How snowy it is?

Somehow we got ourselves here. Was there a pain point that got

you here, that got you moving? What longings get us to like

open the scriptures with some hunger and some and some

passion? What what pain points get us

gathering with people in in a group of group of strangers

we've never met before and being like, I want to be in community

with you. Is it loneliness?

Is it physical sickness or or ailments?

Is it a a painful conflict? Is it spiritual emptiness that

we've we're left in from city life or overwork?

Is it just the basic things of life?

We just need food. We just need money.

We just need protection from danger.

We just need a job. You know, The thing is guys, I

still pray for these things. Like every day I pray give us,

give us this day Our Daily Bread.

I bring, I bring surface touch points to Jesus all the time.

I'm still in the crowds, and Jesus is still finding me in

those crowds, and he's still healing me and he's still

helping me and He's still providing for me, and he could

do the same for you. Truth be told, I still want that

healing touch. I still want that special moment

on the Sea of Galilee. I still want the heavenly

consolations where I know Jesus is speaking to me and leading me

and encouraging me. Oh, it's awesome.

And I want it for you too. I want it for more people and

the Northside of Chicago and all all over this city, not just

from our church, but from all the churches that preach the

gospel. Oh, I want revival and

deliverance from danger. I love a spiritual high.

There's nothing wrong with a spiritual high.

There's nothing. We need them.

We need to sometimes have a spiritual dream where Jesus

speaks to us. Sometimes we need someone to

speak a prophetic word that they had no idea what we're going

through and they spoke something deep.

Deep that they would have never known, but God knew and he told

them to tell us. Sometimes we need stuff like

that, but it just doesn't stop there.

Sometimes we take the benefits without without blessing Jesus,

and sometimes we don't even know it's him.

You know it. It's interesting.

The irony is that in this passage, the only ones in the

crowd to recognize Jesus's true authority and identity are the

unclean spirits. They're the only ones with the

correct theology. Verse 11 and 12, whenever the

unclean spirits saw him, they fell down before him and cried

out. You are the Son of God, and he

strictly ordered them not to make him known.

Jesus strictly ordered them. Hey, you are not the messengers

here. So the unclean spirits in this

text are. They are in a grotesque way.

They're speaking through the people that they have possessed,

and they're using the voice to say the words.

You are the Son of God. They're using the bodies of

these people to kneel down before Jesus, and Jesus silences

the unclean spirits. They're not supposed to talk.

They're not supposed to be controlling.

He would. He would cast them out.

In other parts of Mark, we see Jesus consistently, repeatedly

delivering these poor individuals from the unclean

spirits. It's worth saying too, that

Jesus is not going to build his long term strategy on their

confession. They are unworthy messengers of

his identity. Their theology was accurate, but

they were unworthy. Jesus came actually to form

people who could confess that he was God's Son, with their life,

with their obedience, with a true and good confession.

And that doesn't happen overnight.

Jesus wasn't building his long term strategy on crowds and

popularity. He didn't come to make an

impression, He came to make an imprint.

He didn't come to boost spiritual tourism.

He came to make disciples. And in a world that loves to

scale up, Jesus seems inclined to scale down.

Which leads us to the second, more or more arduous, more

challenging, more satisfying, more personally impactful

section of our text. And Mark starting in verse 13.

This is the disciples here and and he, Jesus went up on the

mountain and called to him those whom he desired, and they came

to him. This is Jesus's small batch

strategy for building his Kingdom.

He separated from the crowd and he went up a mountain.

He went a higher way, a higher call, an upward climb to be with

his father and he invited others to join him.

He identified a small group of people that he desired to be

with. He saw them, he saw something in

them like I want to shape you, I want to form you, I want to give

responsibility to you. I want us to be friends, Co

workers and I want you to inherit my Kingdom.

That's pretty special. He saw them, he wanted them.

He invited them up and they said yes.

Wow. They said yes to the upward

climb, to the upward call. Do you think you would have said

yes, or that I would have said yes?

Notice how relational this is? Verse 14.

He appointed 12. He appointed 12, whom he also

named apostles. That is sent once so that they

might be with him. This is relational.

It's a call to friendship with Jesus.

He wants to share his life with us and for us to share our life

with him over the next, you know, three years.

He would share a lot of mundane moments with his disciples.

Breakfast, lunch and dinner. You know, they would, they would

walk a lot. They would kind of sleep in the

same dwelling places most of the time.

There was a lot of things that you would experience in a close

community. Highs and lows, laughing and

crying, feasting and hunger, praying and playing, conflicts,

OK, awkward moments, beautiful moments, tender moments.

And with every moment Jesus would impart something very

personal from his, from himself to his disciples.

Same imprint he had from his Father.

He would give to the to the ones he wanted to be with.

And it wasn't just this 12, it was it was others that were not

part of the 12, but they were nevertheless formed and shaped

by Jesus like Mary Magdalene and others.

These people would not be tourists in Jesus Kingdom.

That wasn't their approach. They would be, they would be

neighbors. They they wouldn't just be

consumers of Jesus's ministry, just receiving all the

blessings. They would actually be providers

of it and it would be a blessing for them to pass the blessing

on. Verse 4, second-half of verse 14

describes this. He, you know, he appointed them

and he might send them out to preach and have authority to

cast out demons. Now this too is, is relational

because they're going to share in his work.

They they actually going to join him in his work of restoring the

world to wholeness one person at a time.

And they'll become givers, not just receivers of ministry.

They'll be the ones to announce that Jesus is Lord throughout

the Roman Empire. That took guts for them to do

that. They would be deployed to heal

people to to cast out demons, to push back the darkness.

They would be deployed, guess what, to make other disciples

to, to form imprints of other people like John Mark who wrote

this gospel. Isn't that cool?

The guy who wrote this text was a disciple of Peter, who was a

disciple of Jesus, and the work continued.

Small batch strategy. Jesus trusted them with his life

and mission. In the course of three years, he

made the deepest imprint possible on their souls.

Guess what? There was no shortcuts.

There were no shortcuts to a messy, complex, wonderful,

painful personal process, and it's the best imprint that

anyone could make. Notice the names that Jesus

gives in verse 16 and 17. He appointed the 12 Simon, to

whom he gave the name Peter, which means rock.

Verse 17, James, the son of Zebedee, and John, the brother

of James, to whom he gave the name, the very auspicious name

Boadrenese, that is Sons of Thunder, kind of feels like a

teasing name, a little bit like a, you know what I mean, rock.

I would probably prefer rock than Boander.

It's hard to pronounce anyway, from the jump.

Jesus could always see something in Simon.

You're a rock. You're called to be a rock.

He could see in Peter just a very special and unique future

like Peter. One day you're going to be a

strong and humble leader. You're going to be a rock for

the early church through her first few years of of existence,

which are going to be like, it's going to be like a, like a, like

an earthquake or a storm, but you're going to be a rock for

the early church. So he named him rock.

He named him Peter. But to become that rock, there's

no shortcuts for Peter. He had to go through a

three-year process where he would be melted down into like

molten lava, you know, and he would have to be reforged.

He would have to fail before he could stand.

He had to be exposed before he could represent Christ to the

world. He had to go through the process

where he saw his own immaturity and his own instability and his

own fear. And he also had to see how just

how loved he was through Jesus and how unconditional Christ's

love for him was through the cross.

He had to see that first. He had to fail at life, fail at

leadership with Jesus at his side as his friend, encouraging

him, coaching him, and he had to just be humble enough to just go

through it all. And the the same is true for

James and John. You know, Sons of Thunder,

probably a personality trait flaw, family flaw, something

anger. But we know about John.

He became the beloved disciple. He became very affectionate.

He became a shepherd to the early church, very special guy.

And that was a transformation process for him too.

I do you ever wonder if Jesus sees something in you?

Do you? I've wondered that too.

What do you see in me, Jesus? And I just want to assure you

this morning, he sees something in you.

And you know, even Revel, the Book of Revelation written by

John, says that the Lord has a special name for each one of us

who who call him Lord. It's written on a Whitestone.

We'll find out what that name is later.

Maybe along the way we'll get a hint of what that looks like.

All that to say, Jesus sees something in each one of us, and

it's part of his call for us to follow him.

And there's no shortcuts. There's a painful, complex,

messy process for us to become disciples.

We learn what our name is, what our role is, what our call is.

He works with all types and backgrounds.

At verse 18 and 19, we see a different set of Anne's Andrew

and Philip and Bartholomew and Matthew and Thomas and James the

son of Alpheus and Thaddeus and Simon the Zealot and Judas

Iscariot who betrayed him. That's quite a list.

You know, Some of these people were doubters, like Thomas.

Others were zealously confident, like Simon the Zealot.

Not Simon, who was called Peter somewhere outgoing like Andrew.

He was a big evangelist. Like you got to meet Jesus and

you got to meet Jesus. And others of these were type B

leaders. They were not in the spotlight.

We, we hear very rarely about them, you know, and even Judas

is on this list. And I'm sure Jesus saw something

in him. And the invitation for, for

Judas was, was to become a disciple of Jesus.

You know, so this is like there's an uncertainty to, to,

to the, to the call. We don't have to say yes at the

beginning and we don't have to say yes at the end, but the

invitation is there. And guys, this was the plan.

The crowds weren't that. The crowds looked so impressive

and it was impressive and special, but this like was the

plan. This is digging down to the

foundations of our life through Christ and friendship and

community and formation and suffering and highs and lows and

being known and loved into the future and the name God has for

us and how he's calling us. That's the plan.

He healed the crowds, but He hewed the disciples, He fed the

multitudes, but He formed the few.

He gave them a higher call, not to be better than the crowds,

but to serve the crowds, to make disciples of the crowds.

And what a tragedy would have been for these 12 men, to these

12 individuals and others with them, to stay with the crowds

and to pass up the invitation to climb the mountain.

I wonder if we were to ask them, Peter, James, John, Mary

Magdalene, etcetera, like what were the stakes of climbing that

mountain or not? What would they say?

Like if we did you have any idea of what you were getting into

when you climbed up the mountain with Jesus that fateful day?

Maybe they would say this, look, I didn't know that it would

eventually lead to the cross and I ran away from the cross at

first, but then I embraced it because I, I saw that it was the

way of life. It was God's gateway of life.

So I just, I eventually I ran there, even though I ran away

the first time. Maybe they would say I didn't

know how much immaturity and hurts and sins would come to the

surface. I also didn't know how deeply I

was loved and forgiven until they did come to the surface and

I saw the patient tenderness in Jesus's eyes.

Maybe they would say this. I didn't know how much

responsibility I would end up carrying, but I also didn't know

how thrilling it would be to see people set free.

Maybe they'd say, I'm glad I took that first step up the

mountain, even though I had no idea what it would lead to.

But it was just that first step. Here's the way we become

disciples of Jesus, my brothers and sisters, We pray Jesus lead

me up that mountain and then we follow him.

There is that. The thing is that like going the

next step with the Jesus is not going back down to the Sea of

Galilee to repeat the special spiritual experience that we

once had, to relive that era where we felt close to God.

That's not the future for us to become disciples of Jesus.

It's wonderful and we can thank God for it, but that's not God's

future for us. The future is not down into

nostalgia. The future is up into

discipleship. It's an upward climb.

It's a holy challenge. It's tonight, the right next

step. What might that look like for us

here at Emmanuel in 2026? You know, one way, one very

simple countercultural way, is to begin to make space for

friendship in our life with Jesus in Chicago.

The ambient climate is not going to encourage us in that

direction. We will fill every spare moment

with work, projects, productivity, voice memos,

podcasts, fun times with friends.

Like all these things, we will Max out our time.

We will have no space to hear the voice of Jesus and it just

take friendship, as you know takes time.

Do we want to be friends with Jesus?

I mean, that's a very basic thing.

Do we want to listen to him, work with him, do life with him

is a very basic question. So one of the ways that we make

space for Jesus to climb up the mountain is to just take time,

find a time where we can just be with him, to meditate on

Scripture, to take time in silence devoted to him.

Our discipleship team is actually, we have a discipleship

team at Emmanuel. This week.

They met and they've been designing classes and

experiences for us to learn how to practice this.

In fact, I heard a rumor that Father Samuel is going to teach

a course on Colossians, the book of Colossians.

There's going to be other courses, how to read the Bible,

how to pray. There's going to be some amazing

what we had one yesterday on the Book of Common Prayer.

So space for Jesus. Another way of climbing the

mountain is joining a community of friendship with others who

are becoming friends with Jesus and grow in your discipleship

with them. It might mean not just coming on

Sundays, but joining a city group that meets throughout the

city throughout the week and seeking to grow like Christ with

them as well. Or maybe even a smaller group of

peers who will challenge us in our faith.

I've heard talk of what's called triads to other people who are

also like following Christ together and being shaped into

Christ's image. And when, not if, but when our

stuff comes up and we get close enough to other people and the

Lord. Where our immaturities rise to

the surface. Or when our weaknesses rise to

the surface. Or when our unmet desires rise

to the surface and we're just frustrated that we're forgiven,

loved, encouraged, and called up to face our fears, to have the

right next conversation, to embrace a new spiritual

discipline, To watch and pray with Christ, To fast and pray

during Lent. Whatever the case might be, we

just keep taking the next step of discipleship.

You know, one of the things I appreciate most about Emmanuel

Anglican is that this has always been a church filled with people

who want more discipleship actually, than we can offer.

Most of the time. There's a supply and demand like

issue here to quite frankly, that we're that we're seeking to

to correct. We actually, I'm so honored and

blown away by the hunger I see and hear about from from you,

from the church about wanting to be shaped, wanting to grow,

wanting community, wanting to know what does it look like to

follow Christ authentically, richly and deeply in the city of

Chicago Because it's not easy, right?

But you want to. That's why you're here.

And in 2026, I see Emmanuel Anglican forming people of every

age into deeper discipleship and beyond. 2026 too, but starting

this year, more intentional deep formation of of youth and people

just getting started in their careers and people in midlife

and people in the golden years and every, every age, people

getting formed and shaped to be disciples of Jesus.

The thing is that there's no shortcut to Chicago experiencing

the kind of healing we saw at the Sea of Galilee in Mark 3.

There's no shortcut to getting there without us climbing the

mountain. We got to climb the mountain

first. We got to climb the mountain.

Even as we share the gospel, even as we push back the

darkness, even as we pray for justice in our city, even as we

seek to integrate our faith and our work.

There's no shortcut to discipleship for those things to

happen. Jesus is still calling people up

the mountain, not to impress him, but to be with him, not for

touch points, but for a deep imprint.

Not for a moment, but for a lifetime and beyond.

Why friends, it's because of who we are.

We're not tourists, we're neighbors.

And let's become disciples of Jesus starting this morning and

follow him up the mountain in the name of the Father, Son, and

Holy Spirit, Amen.