Man with a Withered Hand

Good morning.

This week's reading is from Mark chapter three, verses one to six.

It says, And again he entered again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there with a withered hand, and they watched Jesus to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse him.

And he said to the man with the withered hand, Come here.

And he said to them, Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?

But they were silent.

And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, Stretch out your hand.

He stretched it out, and his hand was restored.

The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him.

This is the word of the Lord.

Please be seated.

Thanks for joining us this morning.

My name is James Rathman.

I'm the pastor here at Redemption Church Denver.

If you're outside in the parking lot, thanks for joining us out there as well.

If you're in the overflow room, uh we uh uh this is a fun season in the church.

Um it's a joyful thing to be in Advent, to be looking forward together.

What's fun about lighting the hope candle first is that right before Jesus comes, hope hopes hope's about to run out.

All right, I'll see you guys later.

And uh uh we are uh a couple of announcements.

So moving into this next year, we're moving into kind of a new model of gathering large and gathering small.

And we're calling it a parish model.

And what this looks like is uh elders are going to be over small groups of members, and those small groups of members, elders are going to take particular responsibility for, shepherding them, caring for them, and bringing them into the elders' homes for monthly dinners.

We're calling those parish dinners.

And the point of those is just to learn how to feast together.

Feasting is a huge part of Christianity.

Um I was talking with some folks the other day who informed me this may or may not be true, but I guess in the Gospel of Luke, Jesus is always coming from a meal or heading to a meal.

Uh that's uh like he's always eating, basically, which we are too, and that's the main way that we fellowship and get to know one another.

It turns out that's a part of it.

In fact, even today, we uh sort of mimic a feast when we take communion at the end of each service.

That's uh us feasting together.

It's looking forward to the great feast that we'll share in when Jesus finally returns.

Uh so uh that means that this is pretty uh members-centric, I guess is the way to put it.

We're putting a high priority on church membership, as well as a high priority on elders really acting as elders are described to act in scripture, which means that you're connected to the elders of the church, not just a board of directors, but we want to be structured in such a way where we're really taking real interest in your lives, caring for you, praying for you, knowing you.

Um, so if you would like to participate in that uh and you're not a member now, uh it's not too late.

We're just having rolling membership right now.

So there's not going to be one member class that you sign up for.

Instead, uh just reach out to info at redemptiondenver.com and we'll connect with you and begin going through that membership process with you.

Also, uh during this Christmas season, we are uh doing a fundraiser.

Well, yeah, we're doing it.

Um Christmas donation drives for Centennial Elementary.

Now, if you remember this time last year, Christmas Eve was our first service out of the building on Columbine Street off Colfax.

Um, and our first service uh over in this neighborhood was at Centennial Elementary, which is just over there.

It's on this block.

And we met here for Christmas Eve service.

Well, we reached out to uh the principal at Centennial Elementary, and they have a lot of families in need over the holidays.

And they said that the best way that we can support is raise a bunch of money and buy a bunch of Walmart gift cards.

That way folks can buy Christmas meals and they can buy uh gifts and things for their families.

So uh, in order to give, all you need to do is at that normal time of the month when you get your paycheck in, you sit down with your Redemption Church Denver app, and you light your candle, and you pray, and you take out your calculator and you take how much you got in from your paycheck and you type in 10%.

Then you say another prayer or light another candle, and you give 10% of your income to Redemption Church Denver.

Uh there's another tab, uh, other than general fund.

You'll click it and you'll slide down and it will say Centennial Elementary Christmas Drive 2020.

Uh, and give to that fund as well.

And we'll be purchasing Walmart gift cards to give out to those families in need.

We're wanting to take a particular notice of our block.

Uh how can we be a blessing to this school that took us in and treated us so well?

And how can we continue to garner that relationship as we go on?

Uh, those are the those are the uh two announcements.

Oh, also uh you should know we're having Christmas Eve service.

It'll be on Christmas Eve, and we're having two services.

Yeah.

Fans of Christmas Eve.

Candlelight service, there'll be candles, real ones with fire like that.

You'll get to hold fire.

And uh there'll be uh a three o'clock service and a 4:30 service.

Uh so pick your service, come in, join us, we'll celebrate Christmas Eve together.

Now let's talk about how Jesus heals a man with a withered hand, but first let's pray.

Father, we praise you for our community, for getting to come together again on a Sunday and worship you.

Lord, I pray that this rhythm in our lives uh would would serve to anchor our souls in the truths of your scripture, the truths of your gospel.

Lord, as we continue to move through Mark in the Advent season, let us get to know who it is that we're looking forward to coming back.

Lord, I pray that you would no longer be just sort of a character that we half know, but that we would see how you really act towards us in your word, that our hearts would rest in that.

Lift this up in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Okay, so over the past several weeks we've seen Jesus' ministry take shape.

And we've seen him speak in synagogues before, and he speaks with authority.

Even the demons listen to him so that he casts out demons just at his command.

He's able to heal people and claims to forgive sins.

And he's gathering these incredible crowds of sick people and the hurt and the broken who are coming to him in order to receive his ministry.

Now, at the same time as we see the goodness of Jesus' ministry being developed, there's a counter-narrative that's taking place.

When he speaks in the synagogue with authority, he's also offending the scribes and the Pharisees.

When he claims to forgive sins, he is accused of blaspheming by the scribes and the Pharisees.

When he moves through and his disciples take heads of grain and they eat on the Sabbath, he's condemned once again by the scribes and the Pharisees of ignoring the regulations and the laws that they've received.

And so there are two narratives developing.

One is the goodness of Jesus' ministry, and the other is the opposition to the goodness of Jesus' ministry.

Both are growing at the same time.

A lot of us think that the way you can know you're doing well in life is you're not disappointing anyone.

Well, Jesus was doing very well, and he was disappointing a lot of people.

Jesus was doing very good, like Superman does good, and he was gaining a lot of enemies throughout the process.

Both of those stories are developing.

So we see that as Jesus, the incarnate God, presses in more deeply into the community that he came to rescue, he is faced with greater and greater opposition.

And this ultimately becomes the reason for Jesus' death.

This is why Jesus is killed.

It's a hard thing for us to wrap our minds around.

And we think from the outside looking in, it's like this must have just been some sort of strange culture with these strange dispositions.

Because how else could the goodness of God press in somewhere and then result in murder, result in evil being done against him, result in death?

Today we see that tension grow and it's brought to a head, where for the first time the Pharisees commit themselves to killing Jesus.

And what happens that incites that?

At a synagogue, on a Sabbath gathering like today, there's a man with a withered hand, and Jesus heals the man's hand.

That's what incites them to want to kill Jesus.

It's a tough thing for us to wrap our minds around, and it's certainly a difficult thing for us to identify with, but I think as we unpack it a bit more, you'll see that you're more deeply identified with the Pharisees than you would perhaps like to believe.

All right, let's see these tensions grow.

Mark 3, verses 1 to 2.

Mark 3:1–2

Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there with a withered hand, and they watched Jesus to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath so that they might accuse him.

Alright, Mark in his typical fashion is extremely concise and he lays out all the details that we need to know to set the tension of the scene.

Jesus enters the synagogue, and there's a man with a withered hand.

What do we expect?

Jesus is going to heal the man with the withered hand.

And they, Mark doesn't even feel the need to uh describe who they are anymore.

It's just they, but it's the Pharisees, of course, and they are watching Jesus with the, and they see the dynamic.

There's Jesus teaching in the synagogue, there's the man with the withered hand.

It's the Sabbath day, and we know that it isn't lawful to heal on the Sabbath.

So they're watching Jesus with the intention to accuse him.

That's why they're observing Jesus.

It's so that they can accuse him of breaking the Sabbath restrictions when he heals the man with the withered hand.

It's another Sabbath interaction, just like last week.

Now, are they talking about the law accurately?

Well, here's the thing: um, according to the Pharisaical Sabbath restrictions, you were able to do acts of mercy on the Sabbath that related to saving someone's life.

So if somebody was in an immediately life-threatening situation and they had like a log falling on them or something, I don't know.

I haven't been in a life-threatening situation in a long time.

They uh uh that happens at the end of Batman Begins, though, when Wayne Manor, the pillar falls on him, he does a push-up to get it off of him.

If that were to happen on the Sabbath, then you would be allowed to move the log.

But uh if you were uh if you had something that wasn't life-threatening, say just a withered hand, uh, that can wait until tomorrow.

There's that's not lawful to heal that sort of thing on the Sabbath, according to the Pharisees.

A withered hand is of course not a life-threatening situation.

But Jesus seizes the opportunity to make plain what the Pharisees' intentions truly are.

So Jesus frames this in two ways: doing good on the Sabbath or doing harm on the Sabbath, killing on the Sabbath, or saving life on the Sabbath.

Those are the two couplets harm, good, death, life.

Mark 3, verses 3 to 4.

Mark 3:3–4

And he said to the man with the withered hand, come here.

And he said to them, Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm?

To save life or to kill?

But they were silent.

Okay, so Jesus says to the man with the withered hand, Come here.

The man with the withered hand doesn't initiate.

Jesus initiates.

He takes full responsibility for the healing that's about to take place.

In no ways could the Pharisees say this was the man with the withered hand's fault.

Jesus is the one who summons the man.

He takes complete responsibility.

And then he makes the question particularly about the law.

What does the law actually say?

And he reduces it to its most fundamental ingredients.

Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm?

To save life or to kill?

But they were silent.

Good, evil, death, life, good or harm.

Okay, well, last week we saw that when they were picking grain on the Sabbath, Jesus tells a story of David that has nothing to do with the Sabbath, and it doesn't even actually have anything to do with the law.

He frames it in a completely different way.

But this time he's bringing things to a head.

He's saying, let's talk about the law itself.

What is lawful here?

What does the Sabbath regulation that God passed down to Moses actually say?

And according to its regulation, can I do good or do harm?

Can I save life or can I kill?

Let's figure out what we're actually talking about here.

Well, let's look at Exodus 20, verses 8 through 10.

Exodus 20:8–10

This is the first demonstration of the Sabbath commandment as a commandment, because there's Genesis.

Exodus 20, 8 through 10.

Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.

Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God.

On it you shall not do any work.

This is the important part.

You or your daughter, your male servant or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates.

So who is the Sabbath for?

Everybody.

That's right.

The Sabbath is for the whole household.

Okay, now let's just think about this in practical terms.

Your servant makes you dinner every night.

Now, who is the Sabbath for?

Is the Sabbath for just you or just your servant?

It's for everybody, right?

So if you're the master of the house and the Sabbath calls you to give your servant a Sabbath day, do you know what that means?

You're making your own sandwich.

You're having leftovers that night.

And that means that the Sabbath day, the very interaction of it, the nature of the Sabbath day is not just something that we receive mercy on, but it's also a call to give mercy to the rest of those that are in our household.

We think of the commandments of God in such disembodied ways, but Jesus thinks of them in just their clear implications.

Look, if everybody's gonna rest, that means there are going to be some people that are taking on more labor so that others can rest.

So the Pharisees read this law as just a disembodied thing to be fulfilled.

But Jesus understands the law in its intentions and in its practical outworkings.

What is it going to mean if the servants are resting?

It's going to mean that the masters are doing work that the servants otherwise would have done.

It's going to mean that the Sabbath day is not just a day to receive mercy, but it's a day to give mercy.

It's a day to do acts of mercy.

The Pharisees read it and they say that it's just a violation of my ability to fulfill this law in order for me to give mercy to you.

Jesus reads it and he says, it is uh built into the very nature of the law.

The Sabbath day is a good day to do mercy to others.

The man's hand is withered.

It is evident to Jesus that the Sabbath day is a fitting time for him to heal the man's hand.

The Sabbath day suits the occasion.

It is a day when God gives to us rest, when God gives to us our healing.

The Sabbath day fits that, you see?

So that's the first breakdown is do good or do harm.

Considering the law itself, it is evident that the Sabbath calls Jesus to do good.

Jesus is fulfilling the law.

He's not abandoning it.

But his question has a second part, remember?

Which is is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm?

To save life or to kill.

Now, why does he say to save life or to kill?

The man's not going to die from his withered hand.

That can wait until the next day.

In fact, there's nothing on the table, as far as the Pharisees know, regarding saving life or killing.

But Jesus is speaking to the room.

And he knows what's in the Pharisees' hearts.

He knows that they're watching him so that they can accuse him, because they are looking for reasons to kill Jesus.

When Jesus says to do good or to harm, he's talking about his interaction with the man with the withered hand.

When Jesus says to save life or to kill, he's talking about the Pharisees' interaction with Jesus.

Is it lawful to save life or to kill?

So here's how Jesus lays this plain.

And it's made it completely evident what's taking place in the hearts of the Pharisees.

Jesus makes plain that the dilemma that the Pharisees have put him in is that if Jesus does good to the man, they will kill him.

And if Jesus does harm to the man, they will let him live.

Good, evil, death, life.

That's what's taking place in the room.

The hearts are laid completely bare.

And what do the Pharisees say when Jesus makes plain their intentions?

They are silent.

The whole room is brought to a complete silence.

I've been reading long old books lately, which is why for like four months in a row, all of my references were to Moby Dick in sermons.

Well, they're about to all be to this book called The Gulag Archipelago, which is about this man named Alexander Solznitson who was uh uh fought in World War II for the Soviets and then he was imprisoned uh by the Soviet Union while he was a Soviet soldier under Stalin.

And he was placed in their system of prisons, which were called the gulags.

And he describes his arrest.

And he goes through his arrest in this fine detail, and he describes all of the moments that he didn't say anything.

All of the all of the opportunities that he had to cry out about the injustice that was taking place, and he remembers in great detail his own silence.

He says this you aren't gagged, you really can, and you really ought to cry out, to cry out that you are being arrested, that villains in disguise are trapping people, that millions are being subjected to silent reprisals.

If many such outcries had been heard all over the city in the course of a day, would not our fellow citizens perhaps have begun to bristle?

And would arrests perhaps no longer have been so easy?

Remember, in the room, Jesus is talking about healing the man with the withered hand.

And he says, if if I heal him, you'll kill me.

And is it just the Pharisees that are silent to his question?

It's the whole room that's silent.

Sultanatin goes on to say this every man always has handy a dozen glib little reasons why he is right not to sacrifice himself.

Every man always has handy a dozen glib little reasons why he is right not to sacrifice himself, why he is right to not cry out, while he's right to remain silent.

You know, we look back at like 30s and 40s Russia, and we can all agree that Stalin was bad.

He was a bad, bad guy.

He was doing bad things.

Uh and we look back and we imagine ourselves like we're catness moving through District 13, and we were like, look, I know how this story works.

Uh so if I were to have been arrested at that time, uh, then I certainly would have cried out knowing what I know now.

And we were to we would go back and we'd look at the silence of that situation, and we would think, this is so wicked, do you not know the terror that you are a part of as a society and that you are supporting as a silent community of onlookers?

Do you not understand the wickedness that you're perpetuating as these people in blue caps take away your fellow citizens for no charges?

We think of ourselves that way.

In fact, I think we look back into this interaction with Jesus and the Pharisees, and we think, look, I understand that situation just the same.

If I were in that room with hindsight, knowing what I'd be looking into, certainly I would have stood up and said, It's right to do on the Sabbath, it's lawful to do good and it's lawful to save life.

And Jesus would have said, Great, that's awesome.

Good job.

We got one good answer.

But I think what the scripture teaches us is that we would have been silent.

We can imagine one strong man going back into Soviet Russia and crying out and saying, look at the wickedness of this system.

We would look around and see people arrested and see harm done to people, see goodness withheld from people, and it uh that that person's heart would have been full of anger and it would have been full of grief as they looked around.

How much more when the Son of God, who made the world for goodness, comes down and visits the societies that we've made?

And he steps into them and he says, Look at the wickedness that you're performing.

Have you not considered the man's hand?

Have you not considered the impact that this has on his life?

Have you not considered that he could be helped and you could step in and do something?

Look at the wickedness of the world that you've created.

That man would stand up and shout.

That's what Jesus did.

There's one man that identifies with Jesus in the story.

Oh, excuse me, I skipped over a part.

Mark 3, 5.

Well, that's precisely what we see in Jesus.

And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, Stretch out your hand.

He stretched it out, and his hand was restored.

That's the analogy I'm making.

Imagine you yourself, what you know about Stalin, going back, wouldn't you, of course, scream?

How much more the Son of God, when he enters our world and sees the systems of brokenness and the brokenness in our hearts, how much more would he be grieved?

How much more anger would he feel?

There's one man that identifies with Jesus, and that's the man with the withered hand.

He says, Jesus says, come here, and he responds, and he goes to Jesus.

Jesus says, Stretch out your hand, and there's a moment where he could look out, you know, look across the room.

There's the Pharisees, I know what they're here for.

If I stretch out my hand, if I identify with Jesus, I know that I win for myself Jesus's enemies.

Am I willing to have those enemies?

And he stretches out his hand, and his hand is healed.

I think we often imagine that type of strength of character to identify with Jesus, that it comes from some sort of uh we imagine some like William Wallace strong man type of figure.

But do you see the one who identifies with Jesus?

It isn't the one who was strong, it's the one who knew he was weak.

Who knew that without Jesus he couldn't be saved, who knew that if he had to choose between the Pharisees and Jesus, the only one who could actually help him is Jesus.

And so where does his strength come from?

The awareness of his need.

This is so counterintuitive, okay?

This is not like any, uh this is not like any other worldview.

This is not like any other conclusion that you would be thought to brought to be brought to.

And I think that so many Christians miss where the source of our strength actually is, and they try and cultivate some uh some strength that looks like what we expect a strong person to look like in the world, but really a Christian strength is very different.

That's because it's not our strength.

It's Jesus' strength that we depend on.

It's his faithfulness that we put our faith in.

It's our trust in him as our Savior that allows us to be strong.

So, what is the step towards you having the strength to identify with Jesus?

Step one, you have to know your weakness.

You have to hear your silence in the room and then see that Jesus is the one who stood.

See that he is the one that did good towards you.

What was the result of him doing good towards you?

Mark 3, 6, the Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against him how to destroy him.

Is this not the gospel?

Jesus heals the man, and because of the man's healing, Jesus is rejected and will be killed.

What is the gospel?

It is only more than that.

That it is not just because he heals us that he is killed, but it is by being killed that we are saved.

Jesus is the one who wasn't silent in the room.

He knew that his advocacy on your behalf would cost him his life, and it did.

And by that we are saved.

I really want our church to be able to understand like this is a really counterintuitive dynamic.

That it's in our weakness, our recognition of our own weakness, that we're able to move in the strength of Christ because we reach out to Him and we identify with Him.

Take a survey of the places where you don't identify with Jesus.

Are you not identifying?

I would, I would, I would be willing to bet that those are places that you're not identifying with Jesus out of a desire to maintain strength there.

And that identification with Jesus in those places actually needs to come from a position of weakness.

I'll hear this all the time.

Like there's uh what's that expression about religion?

Like it's a crutch for the weak.

Religion is a crutch for the weak.

Have you guys heard that?

Yeah, religion is a crutch for the weak.

Yeah, that's exactly right.

That's exactly right.

Uh Jesus.

Yeah, well, at least a crutch for the weak.

You know, more like life for the dead, but at least a crutch for the weak.

Our church, our faith, our country, it requires so much strength to identify with Jesus.

But I want you to understand the mechanism of receiving that.

It's an encountering your weakness and then seeing that it's his strength that you need.

He provides it.

That's the one who identifies with Jesus.

It's a different type of strength.

And it's quite frankly, it's it's unstoppable.

Because what could be found out about you that could take away Jesus' strength from you?

It doesn't have to do with you.

In fact, all those around you could could realize, wow, you're a far weaker person than I ever imagined.

Perhaps that's why you're so dependent on Jesus.

Yeah, you can answer that question, of course.

I am.

You see the dynamic?

See how it's counterintuitive?

And the whole room was silent.

Okay.

Uh, Matthew, are there any questions today?

Great.

Then let's uh oh, let's remember that Christ brings us in by being rejected.

He is our champion and our hero.

He is the one who had all of the reasons that he should not be the one who was destroyed, a dozen glib reasons that he should not be the one to sacrifice himself, and yet he sacrificed himself for us.

His strength is made certain for us, and it's made perfect in our weakness.

You may not be strong enough to identify with Jesus.

You are weak enough.

Take advantage of your weakness.

In that you will find his strength, not your own.

His.

Isn't this the most amazing faith?

We have phrases like the Lord's death.

That's an unthinkable phrase.

The Lord, his death, and it accomplished for us our salvation.

Take the cup, eat the bread, Christian.

And then you appeal back the wrapper.

I just wanted to undo all that I just did.

Eat the cracker.

We'll feast together.

Father, we praise you for your sacrifice.

Let us be nourished by the bread and the wine.

And Lord, let us remember that in doing good towards us, you took harm for yourself.

Lord, that uh you call us to bring to you our weakness and to find your strength there.

Lord, make us strong.

Give us a humility to see where we really are before you.

But God, let us see completely the love that you have towards us.

Let us hear you say, come here.

Let us hear you say, stretch out your arm, that you would put our lives right, make us functional in the world again.

God, give us the courage to identify with you by making us aware of how weak we are, how strong and faithful you are.

We praise you, Jesus.

Come, Lord Jesus.

Amen.