Sunday, March 25, 2007

Andrew G. Pittman
Sunday Morning
March 25, 2007 (Clay Walker “In View of a Call”)

A Flexible Church
Mark 2: 13 – 22.

I. Introduction.

From 1937 to 1964, the Golden Gate Bridge across the mouth of the San Francisco Bay was the longest suspension bridge in the world. It is almost 9,000 feet long and over 750 feet tall. It has only two towers that are anchored in concrete in the ocean floor and a series of thousands of steel cables that suspend the platform. The platform supports six lanes of highway traffic as well as bicycles and pedestrians. It is still considered one of the “Ten Wonders of the Engineering World.”
The Golden Gate Bridge was built as a suspension bridge so that there would not be a series of pillars to support the platform. Pillars would have obstructed the ocean traffic coming and going in the San Francisco Bay.
One of the most fascinating things about the Golden Gate Bridge is that it was engineered to withstand winds in excess of 70 MPH, and it even survived the 1989 earthquake that registered 7.1 on the Richter Scale. The engineers who designed and built the bridge designed it to stand up to this kind of stress by designing it to move. The Golden Gate Bridge is not a rigid, fixed object. It moves and shifts and sways as it encounters the forces of nature.

GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE DEFLECTION STATISTICS:

Maximum transverse deflection, center span: 27.7 ft = 8.4 m

Maximum downward deflection, center span: 10.8 ft = 3.3 m

Maximum upward deflection, center span: 5.8 ft = 1.77 m

As an example of how the Bridge is built to move, during the winter storms in 1982, the main span bowed approximately 6 to 7 feet


Read Mark 2: 13 – 22.

Mark begins telling us this story by telling us that Jesus has returned to the Lake of Galilee. Do you remember what happened the last time Jesus was at the Lake of Galilee? He found four fishermen, who were engaged in their daily activities. Jesus interrupted their daily work by issuing a simple and straightforward call to discipleship: Come. Follow me. The call to discipleship is a call to drop everything and go on a journey with Jesus. To walk away from your old way of life and to walk together with Jesus.
The first four disciples were fishermen. They were engaged in daily work, and Jesus found them. I think it is significant that they were not searching for Jesus. Jesus was searching for them.
The next time Jesus was beside the Lake of Galilee, he was searching for another disciple. This man was not a fisherman. Fishermen were respectable in the ancient world. They put in an honest day’s work, and no one questioned how they earned their money. Everyone could accept a fisherman becoming a disciple of a new religious leader. However, the next disciple Jesus found surprises us all. He was a tax collector.
More than likely, Levi was a low-level tax collector. Mark did not describe him as a “Chief Tax Collector” or some other designation to make him sound more important. It seems that Levi was a lowly tax man who sat at a toll booth by the road. There are two possibilities for the types of taxes or tolls that Levi collected. Either he charged people to travel on the roadway owned and operated by the Romans. Or, he was collecting taxes on the fish caught and sold from the Lake of Galilee.
If Levi was collecting taxes on fish, this raises an interesting question in my mind. What did the first four disciples—Peter, Andrew, James and John—think about Levi? More than likely, they held a strong resentment against Levi. Fishermen worked hard for their money. Tax collectors just sat by the Lake counting the number of fish caught honestly and then charged money for those fish. Mark makes no mention about this, but it makes me wonder about the relationships between the disciples at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry.
We don’t know what the other disciples thought about having a tax collector in church with them. BUT…we do know what the Pharisees thought about it. They didn’t like it. They were not feeling resentment, they were being judgmental. Tax collectors were known as “sinners” throughout all of Israel. They stole money from the hard working people, and they were closely aligned with the Romans. Therefore, in the eyes of the Pharisees, tax collectors were considered “unclean.”
People who were close to God were “clean.” People who were not close to God were “unclean.” And the Pharisees taught that “clean” people should NEVER associate with “unclean” people, because “unclean” people might make us “unclean” as well. But that was not Jesus’ approach. Jesus was actually searching for “unclean” people who were not close to God.

II. Jesus and the “Sinners.”
The story of Levi is one of the most wonderful stories ever told. I am not going to try to make Levi into a hero for us this morning, because there was not much of anything heroic about Levi. He really was a “sinner.” He really did spend a lot of time working for the Romans. In fact, he was more than likely more loyal to his Roman bosses than he was to his fellow Jewish brothers and sisters. We might even call him a traitor. At the very least, he was not very patriotic.
But Levi did not stay like this for the rest of his life. When Jesus found him, he was a sinner—lost and far away from God spiritually. But then his life changed. Jesus gave Levi the same call that he had previously issued to Peter, Andrew, James and John: Come. Follow Me. And, Levi responded in the same way the first disciples responded. He walked away from his old way of life and entered into a new life with Jesus.
Levi was so excited about his new relationship with Jesus that he actually threw a party. He invited everyone he knew, all his friends and family members and business associates. He even invited Jesus.
There is nothing unusual about Levi’s party. It’s unusual that Jesus accepted his invitation. Jesus was enjoying a party and a feast with sinners, and the religious people did not approve.
Here is one example of a significant difference between the Christian faith and all other world religions. Every world religion began as a human search to find God. This search for God has taken on many different forms. There are rules and regulations. There is transcendental meditation. There are chants and incantations. But Christianity did not begin as a human search for God. No. The Christian faith began and continues to be God’s search for human followers.
Jesus said it this way… Read v. 17…On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Jesus was looking for a sinner, and Jesus found Levi. Jesus called Levi to follow Jesus, and Levi’s life was changed.
The saddest part of this story is how the Pharisees failed to see the miracle that took place in Levi’s life. He was changed. Jesus changes lives.
Everyone seems to believe that Jesus can change lives. That is…Everyone except the religious people… We have the same problem today, don’t we? A man is placed in jail and makes a jailhouse conversion. The other prisoners notice a difference. The judge notices a difference. The parole board notices a difference. But what do religious people say? “I’ve seen this before. He is just trying to get out of jail. This will never last. It won’t be long. As soon as he gets out of jail, he’ll be back to his old way of life.”

III. The New and the Old.
It’s ironic at this point that on the very day Jesus was enjoying a feast that celebrated a changed life, the Pharisees were fasting. They criticized Jesus for spending time with “sinners,” and they criticized Jesus for not observing a fast.
Now there are only two days per year that the Old Testament told Jewish people to fast. They were required to fast on Yom Kippur—the day the high priest offered a sin offering to atone for the sins of the entire nation. And they were required to fast on Rosh Hashanah—the Jewish new year and the beginning of the Passover season.
The Pharisees had added additional fast days throughout the year. Eventually, the Pharisees developed two fasts every week—Monday and Thursday, the days that just so happened to be the market days. Everybody went to Wal-Mart and Brookshire Brothers on Monday and Thursday and watched the Pharisees walk around and act hungry and super-spiritual.
Instead of fasting…Jesus and his disciples were feasting…They were celebrating a new life…A man who had just surrendered his life to the Kingdom and reign of God.
When questioned about his feasting, Jesus told a parable about a wedding feast. It is not appropriate to fast at a wedding. As long as there is a bride and a groom, there should be celebrating. If the groom doesn’t show up for the wedding, then you ought to fast. And Levi has just entered into a new relationship with Jesus, which gives us a reason to celebrate.

One of the reasons why the Pharisees did not understand Jesus and his disciples is because the Pharisees were still trying to hang on to the old system of the Jews. They could not recognize that Jesus was bringing a new system. The Pharisees were waiting for the Kingdom of God and trying to prepare themselves for the Kingdom of God by becoming perfectly righteous. Jesus did not wait on the Kingdom or even prepare for the Kingdom. Jesus announced the Kingdom…Jesus is the Kingdom. Standing right in front of their faces was a man feasting on a day they thought he should be fasting. This man in front of them is the key to the Kingdom of God. Stop waiting for the Kingdom. Stop preparing for the Kingdom. Join the Kingdom!
Jesus pointed out for us that the Pharisees’ system for understanding the Kingdom was wholly inconsistent with the actual Kingdom. It was like sewing a piece of new cloth on an old shirt. The old shirt had been washed hundreds of times. It was broken in and fit on the body in a comfortable way. It has already shrunk as much as it will ever shrink. Therefore, it would be ridiculous to sew a new piece of unshrunk cloth to patch the hole. The new cloth would shrink when it is washed and tear an even bigger hole…And the shirt is ruined!
A similar thing is true about wine. Wine was a large part of the ancient Jewish culture. Every family grew their own grapes. When the grapes were ripened, the family would stomp on the grapes and press all the grape juice out of the fruit. Then they would separate the smashed fruit from the juice. The juice was poured into goatskins.
If the families had refrigeration, they could have preserved the grape juice. Since there was no such thing as refrigeration, the grape juice would begin a natural process of fermentation. The natural sugars in the grape juice turned into alcohol. This is a natural process and did not require any additional effort or even additives. Grape juice automatically turns into wine if it is not kept in a refrigerator.
When sugar turns into alcohol, the liquid grape juice begins to bubble. The process of fermentation creates carbon dioxide gas. This gas caused the wineskin to bulge and stretch. For this reason, every person in the ancient world knew that new wine had to be placed in new wineskins that were still flexible. An old wineskin would not be flexible enough to withstand the pressure of the expanding gasses. An old wineskin would burst and spill all the wine.

I want you to notice something about the new wine and the new cloth. Nothing could stop the new wine from expanding, and nothing could keep the new cloth from shrinking. The new wine and the new cloth were going to move and change. The old shirt and the old wineskin could not move or change, and therefore were destroyed.

IV. Conclusion.
I want to give you a modern day parable. Think of the blue crab. You can find blue crabs on the Texas coast and all the way up the coast to around Boston, Mass. As the crab grows, it is necessary for the crab to shed its hard outer shell. It leaves the shell behind and begins to grow a new shell. If the crab were to remain in its hard shell, two things would happen. First, it would stop growing. Second, it would die.
I think Christians are the same way. I even think churches are like crabs. Now, don’t go home and tell people that I said you were crabby. No. We have to leave our old shells behind and grow new shells, or at least we have to remain flexible.

I want to announce to the world that today is a new day for Lufkin’s First Baptist Church. We are flexible…And we are growing.