Day 3: Humanity Rebels
**Recommended Use**: Listen to the short sermon clip. Read through the provided passages and summaries. Think and talk through the provided questions. Ideally, do all that before, during, or after you meet up to with one or more followers of Jesus.
DISCUSS YOUR READING FROM DAY 2:
Q: What have you thought most about? What questions do you have?
READING:
Mark 5:1-8:32
KEY VERSES:
Mark 5:17; 6:3, 52;
7:20-23; 8:18, 31-32
BIBLE THEME TO CONSIDER:
1.God Rules
2.Humanity Rebels
3.Christ Redeems
4.Repent & Believe the Gospel
Humanity Rebels: We have rebelliously sought our own glory, earning shame and God’s just judgment for our sin.
BIBLE THEME AS SEEN IN MARK:
Last week, we left off at the end of Mark 4 with the disciples of Jesus not trusting Him when He displayed His power of His creation as God.
Today, we are focusing in on point two. This is the reason why we don’t naturally trust God.
Humanity Rebels: We have rebelliously sought our own glory, earning shame and God’s just judgment for our sin.
Do you remember what we read two weeks ago in Genesis 3 and the Book of Romans about our sin? It is summarized clearly in Romans 5:12.
Romans 5:12
"Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:"
Here is the sad truth: we have earned shame, judgment, and death because we have sought to rule ourselves in place of God. That is why we are afraid and distrusting of God. On our own, we don’t know what to do with God. We see His grand handiwork, but we don’t trust His goodness.
God’s creation and rule in Genesis 1-2 is followed by humanity’s rebellion chapter 3. In it, humanity fails the test God gave them and gives into the temptation of the tempter—Satan. God told Adam that they could live according to His word and never die, but if they sought to find goodness and to define good and evil apart from God, they would only find and earn the curse of sin and death. Existence apart from God is not life. It is death.
Q: Does that make sense to you? If God is the source of all life and we cut ourselves off from Him, we chose sin and death instead of God and life.
Adam chose the later and brought humanity and all creation under the bondage of sin and the merciful curse of death. Yes, merciful. If it were not for the curse of death, we would think it is right to go on living in rebellion against God’s rule, and our world would be filled with many more less-restrained horrors!
If we were allowed to go on living in sin without the restraint of death, we would never find the true joy of enjoying and reflecting God’s glory.
So, the earned curse of death is both judgment and mercy to us. We have earned it, but we actually deserve even worse. God still gives us the opportunity to live and even return to God before dying. Eternal death is far worse. Physical death is a constant reminder that we will give account to God.
In addition, imagine what the world would be like if we could just go on sinning without dying. How much worse would our wars and destruction be?
Q: What do you think the world would be like if God did not restrain sin through the judgment and mercy of physical death? What if the worst sinners of human history were able to live without dying? Would that help us enjoy and reflect God’s glory under His good rule?
God created us to enjoy and reflect His glory, so as long as we sin, corruption, evil, and death results. Mark 5-8 makes all this very clear. Please read it this week. It begins by confronting us with a man who is ruled by many rebellious spirit beings. Jesus frees the man, but then the fearful people from the surrounding towns tell Jesus to get away from them!
Mark 5:17
"And they began to pray him to depart out of their coasts."
Q: Do you remember who John the Baptizer was actually announcing when he announced Jesus in chapter one? Who healed this man from being controlled by demons? Who did these people beg to get away from them? Why did they?
Rebels of God do not trust Him when He comes to them. As sinners, we try to redefine God. We do not trust who God says He is or that He is good. So, we reject the God of the Bible, His good rule, and His eternal Son. As sinners, this is our response to God.
Humanity has traded the rule of God for the rule of His lesser creations—which have also been temporarily permitted to disobey Him. The Old Testament and human history is filled with people seeking after and worshiping these created beings. Since we have rebelled against God’s rule, we try to rule ourselves.
When that doesn’t go well, we seek out other people and powers to rule us. Over and over again, the history of humanity has retold this story. It results in wars, power grabs, oppression, slavery, murders, abuse, enslavement to drugs, objectification of people, perversion of the beauty of sex, witchcraft and drugs, and all sorts of ungodliness. Ultimately, the Bible calls much of our sin idolatry. Sin goes after “goodness” apart from God.
These people in a largely Gentile land on the other side of the Sea of Galilee wanted Jesus to leave them to the way they conducted their lives before He came. They would rather have the wealth of pigs and the chaos of demons than to have the rule of Jesus.
Q: How does this seem similar to what took place in the garden between Satan and the first humans? Who were they choosing over God in Genesis three? What did they hope to gain from it?
So, Gentiles did not want Jesus when He came to save them from the enemy. But then in chapter 6, we shockingly find that Jesus is even rejected by His own Jewish family and hometown even after He had raised a girl from the dead.
Mark 5:38–6:6
"And he cometh to the house of the ruler of the synagogue, and seeth the tumult, and them that wept and wailed greatly. And when he was come in, he saith unto them, Why make ye this ado, and weep? the damsel is not dead, but sleepeth. And they laughed him to scorn. But when he had put them all out, he taketh the father and the mother of the damsel, and them that were with him, and entereth in where the damsel was lying. And he took the damsel by the hand, and said unto her, Talitha cumi; which is, being interpreted, Damsel, I say unto thee, arise. And straightway the damsel arose, and walked; for she was of the age of twelve years. And they were astonished with a great astonishment. And he charged them straitly that no man should know it; and commanded that something should be given her to eat.
And he went out from thence, and came into his own country; and his disciples follow him. And when the sabbath day was come, he began to teach in the synagogue: and many hearing him were astonished, saying, From whence hath this man these things? and what wisdom is this which is given unto him, that even such mighty works are wrought by his hands? Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James, and Joses, and of Juda, and Simon? and are not his sisters here with us? And they were offended at him. But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honour, but in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house. And he could there do no mighty work, save that he laid his hands upon a few sick folk, and healed them. And he marvelled because of their unbelief. And he went round about the villages, teaching."
Jesus showed what He Himself would do at the end of Mark's Gospel: resurrect. And yet, Jesus was what the Bible predicted He would be to some: a stumbling block. Isaiah 53 said over 700 years before this that the coming Messianic Servant would be despised and rejected of men and a man of sorrows. His own countrymen would see no beauty in Him. They would hide their faces from him and think little of Him. That’s what is happening here.
Q: Why do you think these people rejected and despised Jesus? How is their response to Jesus similar to people’s response in our day? To your response? To what God said many would do?
God came to His own as the promised Messiah (remember Mark 1), but they received Him not because their hearts were sinful. Instead of turning to the Messiah, they asked the Messiah to turn away from them!
But it was not just people in non-Jewish lands or Jesus’s hometown who rejected Jesus. Word spread all around up to the supposed “King” Herod. You can read about that in chapter 6.
Remember how Mark’s Gospel started? John the Baptist preached, “Prepare ye the way of the LORD…” Instead of preparing to obey God’s rule in Christ and to enjoy and reflect His glory, we see many people sinning against the LORD.
Then we have Jesus’s followers. The disciples sometimes seemed like they were trusting Jesus and then other times like they were not. A vivid example of that is when in chapter 6 Jesus came miraculously walking on the water toward them like in Genesis 1:2 when God the Spirit moved on the face of the chaotic waters. In Mark’s portion of the account the disciples did not recognize Jesus at all—let alone as Yahweh.
Jesus said they didn’t recognize Him because their hearts were so hard that they did not even understand what He had done before that event when He fed the multitude in the wilderness as the Good Shepherd of God’s people—as Yawheh in Exodus!
Mark 6:52
"For they considered [understood] not the miracle of the loaves: for their heart was hardened."
Q: Do you know what “the miracle of the loaves” was about? What event historic event in the Bible should the disciples thought of when Jesus did this? If they understood the connection, who would they have understood Jesus to be?
Jesus had shown Himself to be the Good Shepherd who makes a way in the wilderness, God who walks on chaotic waters, and the Lord come to form a new people who do the will of God. Yet, like us all, the disciples had a heart problem.
Jesus explains our heart problem this way…
Mark 7:20–23
"And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man."
This was Jesus’s anthropology. Though we are made in God’s image, sin and evil now flows from the hearts of humans, even when we are surrounded by a good environment.
Q: How is Jesus’s teaching about humanity consistent with what we see in the world? How does it differ with the common teaching of our day? What do you think about it?
If sin and wrongdoing only occurred when we were influenced by an evil outside force, we would be able to do much better at controlling evils in our world, but we don’t. Why not? With all of our technological advances, why can’t we contain sin and evil?
Because it originates from our sinful hearts. As Romans 6 and Ephesians 2 tell us, we are slaves to sin and dead in our sins. Ever since Adam and Eve sinned, we have followed in their grasping to define good and evil for ourselves and to attempt to de-throne God. We are fallen in sin and rebellion. Humanity rebels.
And though Jesus came doing everything that the Scriptures had prophesied the Messiah doing (Mark 7:37), Jesus was surrounded with disciples and people who did not see or hear Him truly. They were ruled by their sin.
Even those being saved by Jesus still struggled with their sin and understanding. Jesus asked them…
Mark 8:18
"Having eyes, see ye not? and having ears, hear ye not? and do ye not remember?"
Q: Right after Jesus asks these questions, Mark tells us of a blind man Jesus heals. Do you know what is unique about this healing? What point was Jesus making by doing this?
So, after asking the disciples these questions, Jesus illustrated what He was doing for His disciples when He healed a blind man through a process of two healings (Mark 8:22-26).
And now Jesus would begin to teach a series of lessons about who He was and what He would accomplish as the Messiah. But, like with the first healing of the blind man… the first lesson doesn’t take…
Mark 8:31–32
"And he began to teach them, that the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. And he spake that saying openly. And Peter took him, and began to rebuke him."
Q: Why do you think Peter rebuked Jesus? What did this reveal about Peter’s heart and understanding? What is your response to what Jesus foretold would happen to Him? How are you like them?
Peter and the disciples are spiritually blind and deaf. They don’t truly see or hear Jesus. They see and hear what they want to hear. They want Jesus to be the Messiah of their making and give them the desires of their hearts.
And that’s the problem. Their hearts are self-centered and sinful. Humanity rebels.
And the Bible says that you and I respond the same way naturally. We are sinners who do not seek after or fear God. Sin flows from our hearts even when we have a good environment. If we can get by with sin, we try to. If we can justify ourselves, we will. If we can determine what is right and wrong for ourselves without anyone telling us what is right and wrong, we will.
We rebel against God’s good rule and design for us. Instead of enjoying and reflecting God’s glory, we want glory from and for ourselves. Instead of God ruling us, we want to rule ourselves. We would rather partner with other rebels to gain supposed freedom than to submit to God and enjoy true and good liberty.
We just don’t trust God enough to surrender all our life, decisions, resources, relationships, pleasures, and goals to God. We don’t trust God with that authority. We might be okay with giving God some control, but certainly not all of it!
Q: Does that describe what goes on in your heart at all? Do you agree with God that you are a sinner who rebels against God entirely ruling you?
This all seems very hopeless. But God in Christ remains gracious and faithful to make Himself known to them. Christ redeems sinners.
1.God Rules: The one true God created us to enjoy and reflect His glory in all His creation.
2.Humanity Rebels: We have rebelliously sought our own glory, earning shame and God’s just judgment for our sin.
But in love…
3) Christ Redeems: As planned and promised, God sent His eternal Son in Christ Jesus to perfectly live, sacrificially die, victoriously rise, sovereignly reign, justly judge, and faithfully save sinners from God’s good wrath.
QUESTIONS TO ASK AS YOU READ MARK 5:1-8:32 BETWEEN MEETUPS:
Q: In Mark 5:1-20, how do the people respond to Jesus’s rule and power? What does Jesus tell the healed man to tell others about “the Lord”? What does this tell us about how we should respond to the Lord’s rule? What does this say about Jesus?
Q: In Mark 5:21-6:6, what do we learn about Jesus and the right response to Him? What is common about many people’s response to Jesus? What miracle does Jesus do that looks forward to the end of Mark?
Q: In Mark 6:7-56, what is significant about Jesus calling “the twelve” to Himself and commissioning them with authority from Himself? Who is Jesus showing Himself to be by feeding people in a wilderness and walking on chaotic waters? (Hint: Genesis 1:2; Exodus 16:4; Ezekiel 34:23-25)
Q: In Mark 7:1-23, from where does Jesus say that sin and evil comes? What does Jesus teach about adding traditions on top of what God has said in Scripture? How do the two lessons relate?
Q: In Mark 7:24-8:9, why do people say Jesus “has done all things well”? How does this relate to the future hope God has previously given in Scripture? (Hint: Isaiah 35)
Q: In Mark 8:10-30, what are the disciples slow to see about Jesus?
Q: Why are we slow to believe on and understand Jesus?
Q: What is your response to Jesus saying that evil flows from our hearts? Do you agree with Jesus that this is true with you?
Q: Why is sin so bad? What is at the center of our sin?
Q: In what ways have you rebelled against God ruling you?