Jesus Forgives Sins

Now would you stand for the reading of the word this morning?

This is Mark chapter two, verses one to twelve.

And when he returned to Capernaum, after some days, it was reported that he was at home, and many were gathered together so that there was no more room, not even at the door.

And he was preaching the word to them, and they came, bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men.

And when they could not get near him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him.

And when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay.

And when some of the s excuse me, and when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, Son, your sins are forgiven.

Now some of the scribes were sitting there questioning in their hearts, Why does this man speak like that?

He is blaspheming.

Who can forgive sins but God alone?

And immediately Jesus, perceiving in his spirit that they thus questioned him within themselves, said to them, Why do you question these things in your hearts?

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

But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he said to the paralytic, I say to you, rise, pick up your bed and go home.

And he rose and immediately picked up his bed and went out before them all, so that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, We never saw anything like this.

This is the word of the Lord.

Please be seated.

Now, uh, switching from baby dedication, we're uh gonna move back into our time, moving through the gospel according to Mark.

And we are arriving at this really interesting, really visually kind of stunning part of the story where four men carry a paralytic up to the top of a house and they dig through the ceiling of a house to lower him down before Jesus.

Uh and so I want you to kind of switch gears with me, and I want you to consider something that's very unlike a baby dedication.

I want you to consider right now what is your biggest problem?

What's your biggest problem?

Uh and now, one by one, we'll share.

Uh now I want you to try and think, you're in church, okay, so this is kind of a tough thing to be honest with in this context, because you'll you may be tempted to say something like, Well, I know the answer to my biggest problem, so my biggest problem is I'm alienated from God because of my sins and transgressions.

Yes, that is your biggest problem.

But I I want you to think, what is if somebody were to have watched your thoughts for the past two weeks, what would they say you thought your biggest problem was?

Now I want you to consider that.

Your biggest problem if you were honest with yourself, what you think your biggest problem is.

Now, the question is, can Jesus help with that?

Or will he help with that?

That's the question that we're looking at today.

We'll see four men carry a friend, and it's apparent what his biggest problem is.

His biggest problem is he's paralyzed.

And so they bring to Jesus this biggest problem that they have, and Jesus acts in a very surprising way.

So we're going to look at the faith of uh the paralytic and his friends.

We're going to look at the forgiveness that Jesus surprisingly offers, and then we're going to look at the revelation that Jesus provides.

Okay, so let's begin.

Mark 2, 1 to 2.

When he returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home, and many were gathered together so that there was no more room, not even at the door, and he was preaching the word to them.

So we've gotten familiar with this pattern in Jesus' life, which is he's moving around a lot, but whenever he settles in a place, he becomes swarmed by different crowds.

And so Jesus is kind of alternating between this solitude with the Father and then just being swarmed by crowds.

And this time is no different.

Jesus had gone around the region of Galilee, and then he returns back to Capernaum, which is the home of Simon and Andrew.

And likely Jesus at this point is living in Simon and Andrew's home, and it's actually referred to as Jesus' home.

So Jesus returns home from this long trip of itinerant preaching, and when he gets back to this place of rest and solitude, home, he is once again swarmed by crowds.

And that's exactly what happens here.

And importantly, the crowd is so dense inside the home that the door can't even be moved through.

That's an important detail for the story that's coming.

Now, uh although they're crowded out the door, uh it uh an interesting thing happens.

Mark 2, 3 through 4.

And they came, they're not named, but it says, and they came, bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men.

And when they could not get near him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him.

And when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay.

Okay, so four men approach.

Word has gotten out that Jesus is in town.

And we don't know how it got to these four men and their paralytic friend, but they uh but it does.

And we don't know really anything about them.

We don't know how far they walked or uh, you know, what difficulty uh it was entailed, or even what the key motivation was uh for each of the friends.

But yet we see four men faithfully carrying their friend who couldn't move himself to bring him close to Jesus.

But when they arrive, there is uh there's something in the way of their ability to get to Jesus.

And they can't get into the house because of the crowd.

Now, crowds play this interesting role throughout the book of Mark.

Uh, crowds, when we would think of net today, if we were to think of a crowd gathering because of Jesus, which gather around Jesus, we would think, okay, these are Christians, these are Jesus' followers, they're his disciples.

But crowds in Mark are uh basically neutral towards Jesus.

This is not a gathering of Jesus' disciples, this is a gathering of people who are curious about this healer who's moving around and who's preaching with authority.

And so this crowd uh plays this role throughout the whole gospel.

In uh uh in chapter three, verse nine, the crowds almost crush Jesus uh because they're crowd crowding in on him as they're, you know, it's in the name.

Uh in uh chapter three, verses twenty, the crowds prevent Jesus and the disciples from eating.

In chapter five, verse thirteen, uh, a woman has to press through the crowds in order to touch the hem of Jesus' garment.

Crowds consistently play play this role of preventing someone from getting to Jesus.

That's the role that we see crowds play.

Oftentimes our intuition is uh that if a crowd is there, something's going right.

Uh, but the intuition of Jesus and that the scriptures present to us is if there's this crowd there that's gathering, it it can be neutral and it can even be negative.

It can even be in the way of really seeing Jesus.

But these four men, although they see the crowd, they're undeterred.

And instead of seeing the crowd and saying, okay, we just won't be able to get to Jesus today, they come up with a plan.

And so they go to the roof, which there would have been a staircase in the outside that went to the roof of the home.

And their homes had flat roofs, uh, which were used as like balconies.

Uh so you would uh go up there sometimes for solitude to pray, uh, to cool off in the evening.

It was uh it was kind of another room in the home, was the the roof.

And so they climb up the stairs onto the roof, and they were uh roofs that were supported with beams that were flat, and then uh there were slats and they were mudded, you know, so it's like sealed almost with like a type of concrete.

And they get to the roof.

This particular roof also had tile across the top, Luke informs us.

And they say, Look, we've come all this way.

Oh we're gonna see Jesus today.

And so they set their friend down, I imagine, and they say, just a second, and they start digging.

They start digging through the roof.

Jesus is downstairs, he's teaching, and then some, and then all of a sudden it's like you hear a bang, and dirt starts to fall on the crowd as they're gathering around Jesus.

And they're like, what is happening?

And then a hole pryes open, and you see these four dudes' hands, and then a paralytic just lowers down and is placed before Jesus.

Likely some of the crowd grabbed him and he sort of crowdsurfed down, and he's placed before Jesus.

And this is what Jesus says.

He's not like, look, you're interrupting my sermon.

Uh instead, uh Jesus acknowledges them and he says this in Mark 2, 5, and when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, Son, your sins are forgiven.

This is the first mention of faith in the Gospel of Mark.

And notice, it's not that they got an idea, it's not that they adopted a new belief.

The first mention of faith in the Gospel of Mark is action.

He saw their faith.

Faith was something that could be made visible because they took an action.

And what was the action that they took?

They said, we're going to see Jesus today.

We're going to get our friend in front of him.

So what does that demonstrate that they thought, look, his biggest problem is that he's paralyzed, and we know that if we can just get in front of Jesus, that Jesus can heal him and that Jesus will heal him.

And how do they demonstrate such a faith?

Well, with every swing of the shovel, with every tile that they pried away with their hands.

When they first saw the crowd and they thought, it's still worth it to get in front of Jesus.

With all of those actions, they demonstrate their faith in Jesus.

So what's the difference between the crowds and these men?

I think the difference is that the crowds gather together in order to see Jesus.

They can stand back and they can hear what he's saying and they can kind of assess Jesus.

But the commitment of these men was we are going to be seen by Jesus.

We're going to put ourselves in a position where Jesus sees us.

And when Jesus sees us, he'll do what he needs to do.

That's the difference.

Many of us approach Jesus, and I want you to consider your own heart right now.

And in the way that you relate to what you think your biggest problem is and how Jesus is a part of that.

Are you standing in a crowd, assessing Jesus, thinking I'll learn some tip, or I'll learn some spiritual practice, or I'll learn some strategy or some wisdom, so that I can take it from Jesus and then I'll be able to solve this problem myself.

That's the way we approach Jesus in a crowd.

That's I can see him, and then I can take what I need from him and then go use it under my own power.

These men, they say our only hope is if Jesus sees us.

Our only hope for our paralytic is there, there's nothing I can learn from Jesus that can make my friend not be paralyzed anymore.

Jesus himself is going to have to step in and do this.

So they remove themselves from the crowd, they push forward so that they themselves are laid bare and that they are seen by Jesus.

This is the difference between assessment and faith, between the crowd and between the ones that dig through the roof to be seen by Jesus.

And Jesus calls us to approach him in faith, which says, Lord, we lay ourselves before you.

This isn't just so we can gaze at you and perhaps learn something, but this is so that you can see us.

And then, Lord, you do your will.

Then we notice that when they finally lay the paralyzed friend before Jesus, what do you think their expectation was?

There's a healer in town, we're carrying our paralyzed friend there.

What do you think they expect Jesus to do?

Heal him, yeah, that's right.

Great exegesis.

They expect him to heal him.

This is what Jesus says though.

Mark 2, 5.

When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, son, your sins are forgiven.

Look, the the we'd think, okay, yeah, we expected this healing.

Why does Jesus say now in in this space, we see your faith, son, your sins are forgiven.

You think, look, that's not why I came.

I came so that I wouldn't be paralyzed anymore.

I came so that I would be healed and thought perhaps maybe I could walk out of here.

But instead, Jesus says, Your sins are forgiven.

Look, this is the danger of stepping out of the crowd and putting yourself before Jesus and saying, Lord, you do your will.

It means that you're in his world now.

And he's going to step into the space that he knows you need most.

You come to him, you're drawn in by your greatest problem, what you think your greatest problem is.

And if you approach Jesus like a crowd does with your greatest problem, you'll think, okay, that little bit kind of applies here, and that little bit of what he said kind of applies here.

I'm going to take these things by myself and I'm going to try and solve my own problem.

And Jesus is great because he gives me this great advice, this great input, but really I gather it up and I solve my own problem.

When you approach Jesus by laying before him, like the paralytic, you say, I'm just going to approach him in faith, knowing that he's going to give me what I need.

In faith, I'm entering his world, knowing that he is going to be the one that helps me.

Then it's likely that God will not fix the problem you think is most important.

He'll fix the problem that is most important.

God is the master of bait and switch.

But he doesn't use it to take advantage of you.

He uses it to legitimately help you.

You're drawn in by the depth of your problem.

And then when you arrive, you realize there's actually far more going on here.

Think of the way that Jesus heals.

He's always addressing a bigger problem.

Last week we saw Jesus heal the leper, remember?

Now there'll be other cases where Jesus doesn't need to, Jesus doesn't even need to be in the room to heal someone.

The centurion who approaches Jesus and says, Look, I've got people who do what I say.

You're in control of all things in the universe.

Just command my daughter to be healed and she'll be healed.

And Jesus says, Yeah, incredible faith, and it saves me the trip.

She's healed.

And they go back, and the daughter was healed.

The leper, he doesn't need to touch the leper to heal him.

In fact, it's it's technically illegal to touch the leper to heal him.

But Jesus stretches out his hand and he touches the leper.

Jesus doesn't need to touch the leper to heal him.

The leper needs to be touched, to be healed.

What does the leper need?

He doesn't just need his leprosy to go away.

He needs to be drawn back into the community and experience the touch of a friend.

The leper came because of his leprosy, but Jesus presses through that and he says, No, I'm actually restoring the whole of you.

The paralyzed man lays before Jesus, drawn in by what he thinks his biggest problem is, and Jesus says, Son, your sins are forgiven.

To us on the outside looking in, it's like this is a weird turn.

I bet if you were the paralytic, if you were that paralyzed man laying there and you heard, son, your sins are forgiven, I bet you knew exactly what he was talking about.

You might have heard something then that seemed far more impossible than you standing up and walking again.

That's the risk that we take when we approach Jesus, when we step out of the crowd, and instead we step out and we put ourselves in a position by faith where it's not just to gaze at Jesus and take some input, but we put ourselves at Jesus' feet and say, We have faith that you can and you will heal.

Here's the problem that drew me in.

Now do your will.

Many of us in our faith, we experience this type of transformation in our hearts, I think, in this expectation of how we approach God.

You know, it you'll experience something where it's like, Lord, I just pray that uh these plans that I've made come together and that this fear of them being interrupted, Lord, that you would calm that and I would be able to see that this this move or this career change or uh this this marriage or uh whatever it may be, Lord, I pray that you would give me guidance here.

Lord, prevent this bad thing from happening.

And then the bad thing happens.

The plan goes nothing according to plan.

You get the job and then it turns out that it's far worse than the last one.

You make the move and it's way worse than your last city.

You know, you you uh uh we've all experienced those types of turns.

But we realize that this problem that drew us in and laid ourselves in faith before the Lord, when we're in the Lord's hands, He's going to go to work on what our heart really needs.

And oftentimes when we're praying for a plan to come together, for something bad to not happen, uh, what we're saying is, Lord, please make the world predictable and safe for me.

And God's saying, I'm not gonna make the world predictable and safe for you.

That that may be the problem that you came to me with, the thing that you think you need uh taken care of, your biggest problem that you think you need healed.

But the biggest problem that you really need healed is to know that in the midst of an unpredictable, unsafe world, I am with you.

And as you go through this and you realize that things got worse than you possibly could have imagined, and then I was still with you.

That's what you needed.

You see, it you can't get information like that and then go off on your own and cobble together a way out.

Because the problem that brings You in is likely not the thing that Jesus is looking to address.

But when we approach him in faith, when we realize how good he is, that he'll reach out and touch us in our leprosy to draw us in, that when we're paralyzed, he'll forgive our sins.

Then we realize that we're not working with a genie.

This isn't someone that we're just making wishes to.

We're coming to the God who loves us and desires to shape our hearts after him, to truly rescue us.

Now look what this says about the faith that draws us in.

What was the faith that the four men and the and their paralyzed friend demonstrated?

Was it a faith that Jesus could forgive sins?

Well, Jesus had never said that before that we know.

I don't know why they would have thought that.

And it's bigger than me.

And the only answer I think that will be effective for solving it is if Jesus sees it and steps in.

Their faith was just Christ alone.

Christ will solve it.

Christ can help me in this.

My only hope in this is that Christ will step in and help.

And that faith, as immature and ill-informed as it was when it was laid before Christ, it meant their sins were forgiven.

They're reconciled to the Father.

You see, this is the way Jesus is.

Like you just crack the door open a little bit, and he's like, I'm all in.

You're forgiven.

But they continue to get more than that.

The surprise, forgiveness of sins, came from this little shred of faith.

But why did it matter?

Because their faith was in Jesus.

You see, this is the call.

When we say that Christianity is a personal religion, we mean Jesus never healed someone the same way twice.

We mean that you you come to him with this biggest problem of yours that actually draws you in.

And with just this little shred of faith, all of a sudden he's going to start crafting a life that exposes.

Wow, my depth of need was far greater than I imagined, and his presence of care was more personal than I had ever hoped.

The faith that rescued was a faith in Christ alone.

And Jesus continues to demonstrate that this is their highest need and the greatest answer to their biggest problem.

Jesus reveals himself.

Mark 2, 6 through 7.

Now some of the scribes were sitting there questioning in their hearts, why does this man speak like that?

He is blaspheming.

Who can forgive sins but God alone?

Okay, now why are the scribes thinking like that?

Jesus says, your sins are forgiven.

And the scribes are like, can't talk like that.

There's only one being who can forgive sins, and that's God alone.

Only God is the one who forgives.

And the uh uh so the scribes are just sitting there and they're thinking this.

Jesus says, your sins are forgiven.

Like, that's not that doesn't work.

To say that your sins are forgiven, it's blaspheming.

Why is it blaspheming?

Because you're making yourself out to be God.

You're sitting in a position that only God can sit in.

Now, why is that, particularly with sins?

Uh Ryan and Zach are playing up here this morning.

Uh, if Zach were to walk over and slap Ryan in the face, and I turned to Zach and I was like, you're forgiven.

Ryan would be like, no.

In this situation, I was the one who was sinned against.

Therefore, I am the one who gets to do the forgiving.

Uh and I'd say, no, I am the one who forgives sins.

You see, when sin is ultimately against God, when all of our sin is ultimately against our Father, against his design, it is only God who can then forgive.

He's the one who bears the offense.

The one who bears the offense is the one who gets to forgive.

But Jesus stands there and he says, Son, your sins are forgiven.

Well, immediately, this is Mark 2, 8 through 9, and immediately Jesus, perceiving in his spirit that they thus questioned within themselves, said to them, Why do you question these things in your hearts?

Which is easier to say to the paralytic, your sins are forgiven, or to say, Rise, take up your bed and walk.

Okay, notice what Jesus did.

There's this dynamic throughout this whole story of the home and the crowd, the unseen and the seen.

And this dynamic is starting to take place here, where uh Jesus, the the scribes had not voiced this concern of Jesus' blaspheming.

Jesus instead steps into the unseen space in their heart and he perceives what question is being asked.

Just as how Jesus steps into the unseen need for the paralyzed man and he addresses it.

Jesus steps in here and he says, Why are you questioning?

Uh uh, he perceives in the spirit that they question him, why do you question these things in your hearts?

Then he poses this amazing question.

He just is always posing just these paradigm-breaking questions.

Which is easier to say to the paralytic, your sins are forgiven, which you can't see, or to say, rise, take up your bed and walk.

Well, what do you think?

What if I were to say it?

Which is easier to say?

Your sins are forgiven, right?

Because you can't even see it.

It's just like, yeah, okay, that must have worked.

Your sins are forgiven.

Uh say rise, take up your bed and walk, then we're bringing it into a knowledge that like the crowd could see and bear witness to.

You are uh to see the paralytic man rise up and walk, you'd say, oh yeah, that's a different type of power.

This couldn't be, this couldn't be lying.

The crowd comes to Jesus because they want to see the miracle.

In faith, we lay ourselves down before Christ and we say, Lord, do what you will.

See these two totally different approaches.

Here's what Jesus says to the Pharisees, or excuse me, to the scribes.

Mark 1, 10 through 11, but that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.

He said to the paralytic, I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home.

Continuing on in Mark 1,12.

And he rose and immediately picked up his bed and went out before them all, so that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, We never saw anything like this.

Jesus reveals himself as the only true answer to your greatest problem.

But what that greatest problem is, you might not expect or even understand.

He knows.

And the way that we approach that is we lay ourselves before him, we cast ourselves into his hands.

We say, Lord, you do your work in our hearts.

As we see Jesus' character revealed, we just learn how trustworthy he is.

How good it is to be in his hands as he goes to work in our hearts as compared to being in the crowd assessing him, deciding whether or not we get to commit.

That crowd got to see an incredible, wonderful miracle when the man picked up his mat and walked away.

And they learned through that that Jesus has the authority on earth to forgive sins.

But there was one, and it was the one who walked in with a far, walked in, was carried in with a far less informed faith than that, that just laid himself before Christ, and his sins were forgiven.

And it was that one who was able to walk away.

You see how dynamic it is to put ourselves before Jesus.

He does the work in our hearts.

So here's the call that I want you to see.

There are two ways of approaching Christ.

One is in the crowd, where we assess and we try and perhaps glean some information, and we try and gain a better understanding.

We can even, we can even get stronger and better equipped in our doctrine.

You know, the crowd left and they knew more.

But there's another way to approach Jesus, which says, I lay myself down before you.

And before you, I bear what is, to the best of my knowledge, my biggest problem.

And Jesus says, Come on in, I'll take care of it.

And in fact, I'll take care of beyond that.

But he's gonna go to work on you.

The danger is what you think your biggest problem is, there may be something far worse.

You thought you were just lazy.

As it turned out, you've been scared of people your whole life.

And God's not just gonna let you keep thinking you're lazy.

He'll probably put you in situations where you're gonna have to disappoint people consistently and realize, oh my goodness, I'm I'm actually just scared of people.

This confidence that I thought I had in the Lord, it does nothing for my life when I have to really interact with someone.

God is always looking to uncover where the true need is.

That's what it means to lay ourselves down before the Lord.

Okay.

Uh, Xander, any questions?

One.

What is the significance of the fact that the faith and action are carried out by the four friends?

Yet it is the paralytic whose sins are forgiven and is healed?

Yeah, it's a great question.

I was thinking of this as like one of the most beautiful images of intercession that we have in Scripture, where we pray on behalf of our friends.

You know, what is the most wonderful thing that we could do for our friends at the points of their biggest problem?

It's that we could lay our friends down before Jesus.

We're so timid to do that.

We're so scared of bringing something like that even up.

And uh, but yet for these friends, it was apparent uh we can lay them down before Jesus, and that will be the solution.

It's this beautiful picture of intercession.

And uh the other thing is that we think of faith as something that just takes place individually, but faith is fostered and born and becomes effective in the context of a community.

Something that's informed and grows as we believe together and pray together and intercede together.

Uh, there was a nerve-wracking event this this past week with uh a child in our congregation getting some tests back, uh, some like medical tests back.

And uh a group of us were drawn in to just pray and just hold this child up before the Lord in love.

And uh joyfully, it was good news that we that we received at the end of this week.

But in that coming together as a community to intercede and to pray for one another, all of our faith was built up.

All of our joy in what the Lord provides uh and provided was built up.

Uh and so to I think a lot of us feel like we have this faith that doesn't grow and remain so stagnant because we think of it as something that we just cultivate in ourselves alone, uh, and we haven't brought it out into the context of a community for it to really grow and really flourish as we intercede for one another.

Great question.

Okay, let's take communion and then we'll pray.

This is 1 Corinthians 11, 23 to 26.

It says, For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you.

That the Lord Jesus, on the night when he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body which is for you.

Do this in remembrance of me.

In the same way also he took the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood.

Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me.

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

As we take communion this morning, we are reminded that the answer to the question, which is easier, to say to the paralytic, stand up and take your mat, or to say your sins are forgiven.

But we see that the answer is that it's far harder to say your sins are forgiven.

Because we remember that in the forgiveness of our sins, Jesus' body was broken.

Like the if you break the cracker, it will be broken.

His blood was poured out, symbolized by the grape juice that we drink this morning.

And in that we see that the deepest need, the deepest problem of our heart is only solved by Christ.

So we can joyfully lay ourselves in his hands, drawn by what we think our biggest problem is, knowing that he will always cure and solve what our biggest problem actually is, such as his love towards us.

Holy Father, we praise you for this time, for the children that you've brought into our church.

Lord, we ask that you would bless them and their families today.

Lord, that as we take communion this morning, that we would remember that you forgive our sins even with the weakest of faith when we lay ourselves down before you.

Lord, I pray that you would create in our church a community like that community of friends that bears one another when we can't bear ourselves and holds one another up before Christ so that we might together see the glory that Christ has to offer.

Lord, we praise you for the work that you're doing in our church.

Uh and uh yeah, Lord, we just we just thank you for being able to participate in it.

We lift this up in Jesus' name.

Amen.