Your Sins Are Forgiven (Mark 2:1-12)

Alright, if we haven't met, my name is Chris, and we're gonna be opening the word this morning to Mark chapter 2 verses uh 1 through 12.

Mark 2 · chapter mention

If you need a Bible, we have some extra handout Bibles.

We'll be on page uh 902 in that.

And if you don't have a Bible, you can keep that Bible.

That's a gift from the Lord uh to you.

So go ahead and turn there as you're turning to Mark chapter 2 verses 1 through 12.

Mark 2:1–12

I want to ask a question to get us kind of thinking before we actually read through our passage here this morning.

So I want you to ask yourself as we're reading through this, which character are you in this story?

Okay, and one other thing, we do have a big blank spot here.

So if anybody during the service gets too hot, don't worry, it's not a distraction.

Just you can come on right in here.

Uh feel free to do that.

So let's read Mark chapter 2, starting in verse 1.

Mark 2 · chapter mention

Let's stand for the reading of God's word.

It says, When he entered Capernaum again after some days, it was reported that he was at home.

So many people gathered together that there was no more room, not even in the doorway, and he was speaking the word to them.

They came to him, bringing a paralytic carried by four of them.

Since they were not able to bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him, and after digging through it, they lowered the mat on which the paralytic was lying.

Seeing their faith, Jesus told the paralytic, Son, your sins are forgiven.

But some of the scribes were sitting there, questioning in their hearts, Why does he speak like this?

He's blaspheming.

Who can forgive sins but God alone?

Right away Jesus perceived in his spirit that they were thinking like this within themselves, and said to them, Why are you thinking these things in your hearts?

Which is easier to say to the paralytic, Your sins are forgiven, or to say, Get up, take your mat, and walk.

But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he told the paralytic, I tell you, get up, take your mat, and go home.

Immediately he got up, took the mat, and went out in front of everyone.

As a result, they were all astounded and gave glory to God, saying, We have never seen anything like this.

Let's pray.

Lord, we thank you so much for your word.

And we thank you, Lord, for how you speak to us through it.

I pray that we would come to you this morning with open eyes and ears and hearts for everything that you want to minister to us here today, that these things would would sink in deep in our lives.

Lord, I pray that you would use me this morning as your mouthpiece, that you would help me to rightly divide your word, and that this would just be a beautiful time learning about more about you and the love of Jesus Christ.

We pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.

You can be seated.

So we saw last week and the week prior that Jesus' ministry is really starting to draw a crowd.

We talked about how his goal was not to become famous, but to minister to those that need it the most.

We talked last week about how the more people crowd around Jesus for the wrong reasons, the harder it is for those that truly need Jesus to access him.

And we see a prime example of this here, right here today in our text.

So starting in verse 1, it says, when he entered Capernaum again after some days, it was reported that he was at home.

So most likely this home that we're referring to here is Peter's home, which seems to have served as some sort of a home base for Jesus when he was ministering in this area.

But people are watching and they're keeping tabs on everything that Jesus is doing.

It says right here, it was reported that he was home.

So this is what everybody's talking about.

Where is he today?

What did he do today?

What miracles were performed today?

What are the religious leaders saying about what he's doing today?

And it says in verse 2 so many people gathered together that there was no more room, not even in the doorway, and he was speaking the word to them.

So these people find out, hey, he's in our town, he's in our place, and they come running.

And then Luke's gospel tells us that the religious leaders from all over Israel had come to see Jesus as well.

From all different regions.

They're all flocking to him just to see what's going on.

And what do we see Jesus doing here?

He's walking by the Spirit, he's loving people, and he's teaching God's word.

He doesn't have a program, he doesn't have to hang a banner, he didn't have an Old Testament book signing.

Although that'd be pretty cool, wouldn't it?

Signed copy of yourself?

He was simply obedient to walk by the Spirit.

And it says he was speaking the word.

The word of God is powerful all by itself.

God's word does not return void.

It doesn't need a dynamic, dramatic speaker jumping all over a stage to make it more relevant.

The word all by itself is living and active.

You know, the most important part of what we do here on a Sunday morning is what we just did.

The reading of God's word.

You know, hopefully the stuff that we interject in between is helping us to apply it.

It's helping us to further understand it.

But the most important thing is the reading of God's word, because that's his words directly.

You know, I think the church can fall into wrong thinking sometimes of where we feel like we need to help God.

Well, you know, the word isn't enough to attract people, so we should add this, you know, to make it more exciting.

Or sometimes we can even soften our doctrine or soften the gospel to make it less offensive because we think it's going to draw more people in.

We can start to compromise so as not to offend anyone.

But I guarantee you that wasn't what Jesus was doing here.

We see him loving the people, walking by the Spirit, and teaching the word.

And the word of God and the gospel are offensive to those that don't believe in it.

And Jesus is speaking the truth to these people.

You know, these are things that I, as your pastor and we as the elders of this church need to keep in mind.

As pastors and elders, we can start to reason, you know, well, attendance is down, or numbers are down, or giving is down, or whatever it is, and can be tempted to operate out of the flesh.

But as long as we're operating in the spirit, we're never gonna have to worry about those things.

Jesus never operated in the flesh once, and they couldn't find a place big enough to hold this crowd indoors.

Let's go to verse 3.

Look at that with me.

It says, They came to him bringing a paralytic carried by four of them.

So before we read any further, I want to point out two different things about what we're seeing just in this verse here.

First, isn't it amazing how approachable our God is?

How approachable Jesus is, and even more so for us here today.

So, followers of Christ, we have the Holy Spirit living inside of each one of us.

I can't think of a God being more approachable than that, wanting to live inside of us and become one with us.

But Jesus shows his approachability with this packed house that we see right here.

He didn't have bodyguards, he didn't have locks on the doors, there wasn't a guest list waiting for people to come in.

He welcomed the common people along with the religious leaders to come in and to be with him.

Now the second thing Okay, well, wait, okay.

The second thing that I want to point out in verse 3 this guy, the paralytic that we're looking at here, had some great people surrounding him.

You know, maybe it was family, maybe it was neighbors, maybe it was friends that were carrying him to this place.

But we see these four people help carry this man's burden, so to speak, and being willing to fight for him and to get dirty for him.

This is why fellowship and community is so important in our walk with the Lord.

Hebrews 10 25 talks about not forsaking the gathering of the brethren, the gathering of the church.

And that's why we're gathered here today.

That's why we gather in home groups, that's why we encourage and put an emphasis on community in this church.

There are going to be times where we'll need to help carry a bed.

And sometimes, and this is usually harder for us, there's gonna be times where we're the ones in the bed and need the help of others to carry us.

The Christian race is meant to be gone through together.

God refers to us as the sheep of his pasture.

And there's this picture throughout all of Scripture where God is the good shepherd, and we as his people are his sheep.

And I have to say, that's not a compliment for us to be called a sheep.

I raised sheep growing up uh in 4-H, uh, a lot of different sheep.

Now my daughter's doing uh that as well.

She's raising sheep.

My son just got into it as well.

When I was raising sheep, though, I was doing it with my older siblings, and there was always other animals around.

There was other sheep, there's pigs, there were steers, and stuff like that.

But when my daughter got her first sheep for 4-H, we made a big mistake, and we only got one sheep, and we realized real quick that sheep were not created to be alone, they're a herd animal.

And that sheep would bleat.

That's the the sound that they make, the bass sound.

And it would bleat all day long, and it would wake us up in the middle of the night bleeding, basically saying, Hey everyone, where are you?

I'm over here.

I'm stuck in this pin.

And it was sad.

Our neighbors got upset.

One of our neighbors went on a two-week vacation just to get away from the sheep.

Not even joking.

It was that bad.

My daughter was making cookies and writing apology notes to all the neighbors and taking them over.

Sorry, my sheep is so loud.

But then we learned that if you want a quiet sheep, you have to get more than one.

So my son started getting a sheep.

He's not old enough for 4-H yet, but he started getting a sheep just to keep the other one company.

And now we have peace in the neighborhood.

But all that to say, we were created just like that first sheep that my daughter had to be in community with one another, to celebrate, and to share life together, and also, as we see here today, to bear one another's burdens, just like this paralytic here today.

So let's take a look at the faith of these four carrying the bed.

These four were taking a huge risk to the point of being so sure of Jesus that they destroyed private property.

Which makes me ask you know, is my faith that strong?

Is my faith that evident where I'd be willing to take a risk this big?

You know, I'm guilty of this too, but when we pray for healing for someone, whether for cancer or the common cold, do we really believe that God has the power to do it?

Like the old adage, if you're going to a prayer meeting to pray for rain, you should bring an umbrella with you.

That's what faith is.

These guys were bold in their faith.

Now, in regard to faith, Pastor Joe Fosh says this.

He says, Sometimes we can tend to get stuck in the paralysis of analysis.

Where God tells us to take a step and then we overthink it and end up saying no to him.

These four easily could have said, Well, Jesus is probably too busy to see us right now.

They could have said, Well, all these people are gonna get really mad at us if we just kind of cut in line.

Or, you know, we can't destroy this roof.

This is private property of another person's home.

But these four that we see were so determined, and they had an amazing amount of faith.

Notice Jesus didn't point out the faith of the paralytic in verse 5.

He pointed out the faith of the four that were carrying the mat.

And for all we know, the paralytic was saying, Stop! This is embarrassing.

Put me down, don't make such a fuss.

We'll just come back later.

But like these four, I believe that sometimes God wants us to press in.

He wants to see us break through a roof.

He wants to see us show great faith.

And here's why I think this: our faith is grown through practice.

We trust God for something and we see him come through.

And then we trust him for a little bit more, and we see him come through, and so on and so on.

Until we come to a point that we just understand that God will never leave us or abandon us.

That he's always going to come through.

And that our faith, we never have to question it.

That we can just trust God with everything.

Could you imagine the faith of these four after this story we're going through today?

They probably had, you know, such an abundance of faith, like, wow, God can do anything.

Let's go bust through a bunch of other roofs and see what happens.

But stepping out in faith is part of our growth process in becoming more like Jesus.

Now, at this point, you may be saying, Well, what about Romans 10:17?

Romans 10:17

You know, faith came from hearing and hearing by the word of God.

I just want to clear that up.

That's talking about salvation.

That's coming talking about coming to faith in Jesus Christ.

Today we're talking about our faith in God being stretched and being built up as we live out this life.

So before we go into verse 4, I want you to imagine as we read verse 4 that you are the homeowner of this house that Jesus is in.

Okay?

Verse 4.

Since they were not able to bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him, and after digging through it, they lowered the mat on which the paralytic was lying.

So when I hear this, I'm always thinking about the homeowner.

Like, what were they thinking?

What did they have to go through as this was taking place?

And the word uncovered here might give you the wrong idea.

This wasn't some canvas awning that they neatly, you know, just rolled back.

The roofs at these times were usually accessible by means of an exterior staircase.

And they spent a lot of time on the roofs just trying to cool down in the summer heat, whether in the morning or in the evening.

But most of these roofs were made out of beams, and then laid on top of that were branches, clay, mortar, tile, just kind of whatever they could find.

These are thick roofs that can support the weight of people walking around on them.

So when it says they removed the roof, this made a huge mess.

They literally had to dig through it.

In Matthew and Luke's gospel, when they're given the same count, we don't see the level of detail that we see within Mark's Gospel.

So remember, this is almost universally agreed upon that this was Peter's home, right?

Also remember that the author here, Mark, was a scribe of Peter's.

Some say this gospel should be called the Gospel of Mark according to Peter, because it's thought that Mark got all of his information from Peter.

So where is Mark getting his information from?

The homeowner, right?

So we see a little more detail here, and this is just how my mind works.

But I can picture Peter telling Mark this story with all the gory details.

Then these crazy guys started digging a hole in my roof, and debris was falling everywhere, and then my wife started yelling at them because of the mess that they were making.

Jesus heals the guy, and then we spent the next week cleaning up and patching the roof, and every time that it rains, we still get a leak right in that spot.

And I could just picture Mark sitting there, just like, I'm just gonna say that they uncovered it and dug a hole.

You know, then we'll just move on.

I say that jokingly, but sometimes ministry's messy, and sometimes there's some cleanup that needs to be done after.

And I really don't see Peter and the cleanup crew complaining after all of this happened.

You know, when we see the hand of God moving, we often have messes to clean up.

Not from God, but from people.

When people are getting saved and God is moving, it can get messy from our perspective.

You know, a friend of mine in college, through a college ministry on campus when we were at Cal Poly, he got to pray with a guy after a meeting one time, and he got to lead that guy to faith in Jesus Christ.

And he there was a group of them, and they prayed for this guy, and this guy was all fired up, and they said amen.

And the guy says, I feel so bleeping, unbelievable right now.

But he didn't say bleeping.

And my friend was just sitting there and he was just like, I don't know what to do with this.

This guy just gave his life to the Lord, but there's been no process of sanctification going on, and so it was just like that's awesome! Good for you.

In this context of a church plant, we should expect to have some messes that we're gonna need to address from time to time.

I mean, isn't that what the letters are in the New Testament to all of these new churches that we're getting started up?

There's a new church, things have gotten a little messy and confusing, and Paul and others jump in and just say, Hey, let me help you get this straightened out.

All that to say, it's okay if things get a little messy from time to time, as long as we're working toward getting things straightened out, as long as we're working toward and through that process of sanctification.

Verse 5.

Seeing their faith, Jesus told the paralytic, Son, your sins are forgiven.

Now, we obviously don't know what this guy was thinking as he's looking into the eyes of Jesus.

But I wonder if there was a little bit of Isaiah chapter 6 going on here.

Isaiah 6 · chapter mention

When Isaiah had the vision of heaven in all of its glory, and Isaiah was just wrecked by everything that was going on.

He said, I am undone.

I'm literally, I'm just bursting at the seams with everything that he's taking in.

And then when confronted with God's glory, he was immediately convicted of his sin.

And God immediately made a way to cleanse him.

This guy that we're looking at here, this paralytic, was looking into the eyes of the Son of God.

And it could be that he was reminded of his sins and that Jesus was reading his thoughts as well.

Or maybe this guy is embarrassed at the scene and the mess and the commotion and all of the attention that he's getting, thinking, Jesus, I told him not to do it, but they did it anyway.

And what's the first thing that we see Jesus do here?

He calls him son.

Some of your translations will say child.

Jesus chooses an affectionate word and he uses it to address him as child.

So Jesus just sets him at ease right away.

He knows what's exactly what's going on, what this guy needs, and he sets him at ease.

And he says, Son, your sins are forgiven.

So this is the first time in the Gospels that we see Jesus forgiving sins.

So let's talk about that a little bit.

The word here that's used for forgive, it means to depart or to send away or to forsake.

And in this moment, I wonder if Jesus was thinking of Psalm 103, because there's a ton of similarities going on here.

Psalm 103 starting verse 12, I'll just read it to you.

It says, As far as the East is from the West, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.

As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him.

You know, I heard a pastor say one time that he's so thankful that in Psalm 103 it says that our sins are gonna be cast out as far as the east is from the west.

Because if it was north and south, if you go far enough north, eventually you're gonna start heading south.

If you go far enough south, eventually you're gonna start heading north.

But we can head east as long as we want and never stop heading east, and we can head west as long as we want and never stop heading west.

And that's how far God has cast.

Our sins away from us.

So Jesus tells this guy, Your sins are gone.

They have departed.

Now, could you imagine the reaction of the crowd?

It's probably twofold.

The first being, who is this that claims that he can forgive sins?

And the second being, this guy came to be healed by Jesus, not forgiven of his sins.

I can imagine the guys on the roof as Jesus says, your sins are forgiven.

They're looking down through the hole, like, no, Jesus, the legs.

It was the legs we brought him for.

Heal the legs.

But Jesus' words, as we're going to see, are backed up by his works.

So first Jesus tells this guy, your sins are forgiven, and then he backs those words up through the healing.

David Guzick says this in his commentary.

He says, Yet Jesus knew what the man's real need was and what his greatest need was.

What good was it if the man had two whole legs and walked right into hell with them?

Think about that.

What good would it be if he had two whole legs and walked right into hell with them?

The biggest need that anybody has right now is Jesus.

Is the forgiveness of our sins.

What good is it to have a temporary need met if you're on the road to hell?

The greatest need for this paralytic is his sins being forgiven, and Jesus knew that.

So unfortunately, this is one of the verses that people will use to argue that if you're suffering or you're sick or you're going through a trial, it's because there's sin in your life.

And this was a common belief in Jesus' day.

And it creams it creeps into some modern-day theology as well.

But what Jesus is not saying is that this man was a paralytic because of his sins.

That's not why that came first.

That's not what this passage is about.

We see another example of a healing in the Gospel of John chapter 9, starting verse 1, and I'll read it to you.

John 9 · chapter mention

As he, referring to Jesus, was passing by, he saw a man blind from birth.

His disciples asked him, Rabbi, who sinned?

This man or his parents, that he was born like this.

Neither this man nor his parents sinned, Jesus answered.

This came about so that God's works might just be displayed in him.

So part of the purpose of this paralytic's life was so that the saints sitting in a Tascadero right here this morning on this beautiful day could learn about faith, could learn about Jesus.

And so we could see God's works and power displayed.

God had a purpose in this man's suffering.

He had a purpose in Jesus' suffering.

And he has a purpose when we suffer as well.

And if we'll allow it, God will glorify himself in our suffering.

And I know that doesn't sound very fun, does it?

But if we allow him to, he can glorify himself in our suffering.

Now, let's look at the reaction to this statement of this man's sins being forgiven.

Verse 6.

But some of the scribes were sitting there questioning in their hearts, why does he speak like this?

He's blaspheming.

Who can forgive sins but God alone?

Right away, Jesus perceived in his spirit that they what they were thinking and why they were thinking like this within themselves, and said to them, Why are you thinking these things in your heart?

That had to be an eye-opener to these guys that were doubting, right?

Jesus is reading their thoughts, and they just realized, oh man, this guy's actually reading what's going on on the inside.

So Jesus responds to them.

Verse 9.

Jesus says, which is easier to say to the paralytic, your sins are forgiven, or to say, get up, take your mat, and walk.

Both of these things could only be done by God, right?

But what would have happened if Jesus only did one of these things?

Have you ever thought about that?

If Jesus only forgave this man's sins, no one would know if he's really forgiven this side of eternity, would they?

There's no proof of it.

Now, if he only heals physically, he'd probably be accused of witchcraft or sorcery or demonic activity, which he was in other areas of the Gospels.

If he only heals physically, then there's going to be all these doubters.

So Jesus does this.

He does something only God can do.

And he proves that this man's sins are forgiven and that he is God and that he has the authority of God.

And I love how precisely and how exact Jesus can silence his critics.

He can even silence their thoughts.

You thought about that?

So going back to what we talked about earlier, Jesus is healing.

One, because he loves these people, but two, to prove that he is God.

But forgiving sins is a greater miracle than healing the paralyzed.

Have you thought about that before?

Physical healing has a life expectancy.

It only lasts as long as you do.

But spiritual healing lasts for an eternity.

And that's a much bigger miracle.

Warren Wearsby puts it like this: He says, Forgiveness is the greatest miracle that Jesus ever performs.

It meets the greatest need, it costs the greatest price, and it brings the greatest blessing and the most lasting results.

You know, we so often get excited when we witness or hear about a physical healing.

And we should.

We absolutely should.

But then we'll hear about somebody getting saved and we're like, oh, praise the Lord.

Which one's a bigger miracle?

Which one's a greater miracle?

Salvation of any human is the greatest miracle that we could ever witness.

And it should be the miracles that we're pursuing.

It's salvation.

Verse 10.

But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on the earth to forgive sins, he told the paralytic, I tell you, get up, take your mat, and go home.

Immediately, there's that word again.

He got up, took the mat, and went out in front of everyone.

As a result, they were all astounded and gave glory to God, saying, We have never seen anything like this.

So I just imagine half the room rolling their eyes when Jesus says, Take up your bed and walk.

Like, yeah, right.

I also imagine the other half is sitting there with an amazing hope that's starting to stir inside of them.

They've heard about Jesus.

Maybe some have witnessed some of the miracles that he's already done.

As Jesus was saying these words, I just imagine that their hearts probably skipped a beat in anticipation and in expectancy of what was going to happen next.

Then Jesus heals this man who was paralyzed for who knows how long.

And he walks out the room and he's good.

And there's no physical therapy, there's no two-week checkup for this guy.

Because when God heals, he heals completely.

If you've ever had a cast on one of your arms or on your legs, you'll know how quickly the muscular atrophy will take place.

And it just shrinks down, which just in a matter of weeks.

And who knows how long this guy's been paralyzed.

He might not have any, you know, muscular development.

Think of the last time that these nerves actually fired.

So as they're watching this healing, they're probably seeing this man's legs just start to balloon up and the muscle definition starting to take place within his legs.

And he doesn't have to work on balance or anything.

He just hops up, picks up his mat, and he takes off and he's good.

And I mention that because in the same way, when Jesus forgives, he forgives completely.

And we're given a new life, a life made whole.

And we're born again into the family of God.

2 Corinthians 5.17 says, Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.

The old has passed away, and see, the new has come.

Jesus does a spiritual and a physical healing at the same time for this guy.

He not only got a new fully functioning body, he got a new, fully functioning spiritual life in Jesus Christ.

And in verse 12 it says, They were all astounded and gave glory to God.

You know, all in the Greek means all.

And I say that because that includes the naysayers, the scribes, the ones that are having doubts.

It says, All were amazed and glorified God.

You know, we see another healing in the book of Acts, which we've actually just went through this passage in our home groups.

And it has a similar result.

You remember in chapter 3, there was the guy that was carried every day to the temple to beg.

He was lame from birth, it says.

Peter and John come by in Acts chapter 3.

Acts 3 · chapter mention

The Holy Spirit taps them on the shoulder and says, Heal that guy.

And through the power of the Holy Spirit, this guy gets healed.

And as a result, 5,000 people come to faith in Jesus Christ.

And I want you to think about something.

How many times do you think Jesus walked by this guy?

It says he was there every day begging.

Jesus was in the temple quite a bit.

How many times did Jesus walk by that guy and not heal him?

I mention this because God had a timing that he was waiting for for the healing of this guy.

Jesus didn't heal him because he had a purpose for this guy later.

The Holy Spirit never tapped Jesus on the shoulder and said, Heal that guy.

Instead, he did that to Peter and John later, according to his purposes and according to his timing.

And I mention all this because if you have an ailment, or if you've prayed for somebody else for healing and you haven't seen it happen, God's going to do what brings him the most glory.

And this is the part that we don't like in his timing.

So, like in our scripture today, so that all were amazed and glorified God.

In Acts it says the guy was praising God, and the onlookers were filled with awe and astonishment at what had happened.

So very similar result.

When the Spirit of God moves, God is glorified, not people.

When you hear of great things happening and a person is glorified, run the other way.

These miracles were for the glory of God.

Jesus' whole life and ministry was for the glory of God.

And what are we called to do?

We talked about this a couple weeks ago.

To be just like a rabbi.

To be just like Jesus.

That's our whole goal.

And all that we're doing here, meeting here as a church, is to become just like Jesus, just like our rabbi.

So I want to leave you with how we started.

Placing yourself in this story and asking, which are you?

Are you the paralytic, either physically or spiritually, that needs a healing?

Are you one of the scribes where you just have a lot of doubts in your mind about everything that's going on in your spiritual life?

Are you the friends that were getting dirty and carrying the mat and helping out?

Or are you the believers that were just there because they just wanted to be with their savior?

Or are you the homeowner that's just looking saying, this is a mess.

I want nothing to do with this.

With that, which do you hope to be?

I don't know about you, but I want to be one of the four guys that carried the bed.

They had faith, they had the hope, expectancy, belief, love.

They had the works, they had the right mentality.

Which makes me ask, how am I helping carry somebody else's bed right now?

How am I taking risks in my faith?

It also makes me ask, how am I one of the naysayers, one of the scribes that's having doubts and battling in my mind with the Lord?

Or how am I the homeowner that's worried about the mess that might come?

Or maybe spiritually speaking, you're the paralytic and you need to hear for the first time today, son or daughter or child, your sins are forgiven you.

And if that is you and you've never heard those words from Jesus and you want to, today is the day to give your life to Jesus Christ, to allow him to wipe you clean and to heal you spiritually and to give you new life.

And if that is you, I would love to talk to you after service or any one of the leaders that's here today.

We'd love to talk to you more about that.