Palm Sunday

Andrew G. Pittman
Sunday Morning (Palm Sunday)
April 1, 2007
The Cross and Discipleship
Mark 8: 34.

I. Introduction.
Today is Palm Sunday—the Sunday before Easter. Traditionally, this is the day that Christians unite around the cross and suffering of Jesus. It is the day that we remember Jesus’ riding into the city of Jerusalem on a donkey. The crowds were cheering, and the children were dancing, and grown men were shouting “Hosanna, Hosanna, Hosanna to the King of Israel!” For one brief moment, all the people of Jerusalem recognized who Jesus really is. Yet, less than a week later, these same people shouted “Crucify Him!” And they helplessly stood by to witness the shame and rejection Jesus suffered as our crucified Lord.
Today, I want to direct your attention to the cross—the “Old, Rugged Cross” on which the Prince of Glory died.
I want you to see a cross that a friend of mine gave me last year for Christmas. My friend is one of the church secretaries from First Baptist Church, Canton, Mississippi. We stopped by her house when we traveled to visit my family last Christmas.
This cross is a special gift she gave me. It is special to me for at least two reasons. First, it was made from wood taken from a house that our church in Mississippi owned while I was pastor. The house was one of only a precious few Antebellum houses remaining in Canton. It was built in 1860 and was used as a Post Office during the Civil War. Adjacent to the house was the last remaining, free-standing “Slave Quarters” in Madison County Mississippi.
The church purchased the house, because we needed the land for building expansion. We worked with the Historical Commission to find a buyer who would relocate the house to a suitable place to be restored. During my time in Canton, I worked with three potential owners. We did everything we could do to relocate the house—including donating the house and slave quarters to the Historical Commission—but the Historical Commission made us look like the bad guys in every form of local media.
The Historical Commission never accepted the house as a gift from the church, because they could not afford the estimated $1 Million in renovation costs. In the Summer of 2005—after I had left Canton—the house and slave quarters burned. This cross is what is left from that fire.
This cross is made from wood that is nearly 200 years old. It’s really not very pretty. It has lived through the Civil War in Mississippi; intense racial wars; the devastation of fire; and two centuries of suffering. Today, this ugly wood with a horrific past forms a beautiful religious symbol—the cross. A checkered past…But a wonderful future.
This cross has experienced the same transformation as Jesus’ cross. In the First Century world, there was nothing beautiful about a cross. It was an instrument of torture. It was an inefficient way for a criminal to die. But it was the perfect way to steal the humanity and dignity from men who had committed crimes against the Roman Empire. Yet, the cross was also God’s chosen method to demonstrate his love for all sinners.
It should surprise us that God’s only Son faced such a shameful execution. It should surprise us even more that Jesus invited us to embrace the suffering and shame of the cross…

Read Mark 8: 34.
The Gospel of Mark begins with the words: “The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God.
In this one, short verse Mark spelled out his entire premise for writing this book. Mark wants to tell us the story about Jesus. This story is the Gospel—that is The Good News. This Good News story focuses on Jesus, who is the Christ.
The Greek word “Christ” is the Greek form of the Hebrew word “Messiah.” So, Christ is not Jesus’ last name. Christ is his title. It describes who Jesus is and what he came to accomplish on earth. Both “Christ” and “Messiah” can be translated to mean “The Anointed One.” This means that Jesus had a specific mission and purpose to fulfill.
The Jewish people were hoping and praying for the Messiah to come and restore Israel to her rightful place among the nations. Israel was at one time a significant nation with a God-given purpose in the world. The Messiah was the Promised One, who would reestablish Israel as a prominent nation and no longer one of the many nations that served the Roman Emperor. They had hoped for a political leader who could rally support among the Jewish people. They had hoped for a military leader who would lead an insurrection against Rome. But Jesus was neither a governor nor a general. Jesus was something completely different. Jesus was the Son of God.
In fact, those of us who read the Gospel of Mark know who Jesus is just by reading the first verse. Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. So, as we read the Gospel, we have an opportunity to witness how the disciples, the women and the crowds gradually begin to gain understanding of who Jesus is. But no one seems to understand Jesus.
Well, there was one man who recognized Jesus as the Son of God. It will surprise you. It wasn’t one of the disciples. It wasn’t a religious person. It wasn’t even one of the many people Jesus healed. No, it was a Roman soldier who stood at the foot of the cross when Jesus died. In Mark 14: 33 – 39, we read Mark’s account of Jesus’ death. When Jesus had taken his last breath, the Roman soldier said, “Surely this man was the Son of God.” I understand this to mean that there is only one way to recognize Jesus for who he truly is…The Cross. We have to accept the cross if we want to recognize Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God.
In Mark 8, Peter got very close to understanding Jesus. Jesus asks, “Who do people say that I am?” The disciples answered, “Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and still others, one of the prophets.” Then Jesus asked a personal question: “But what about ya’ll? Who do ya’ll say that I am?” Peter was the first one to answer, “You are the Christ.”
Since you and I have already read Mark 1: 1, we expect Peter to keep going… “You are the Christ, the Son of God.” But he doesn’t go far enough. Peter stops short of confessing who Jesus really is…The Christ, the Son of God.
Jesus went on to explain that is was necessary for the Christ to suffer rejection and crucifixion in order to fulfill the role God had anointed Jesus to fulfill. Peter rebuked Jesus by saying, “No, Lord. This cannot be.”
At this point, we can make a choice between two alternative understandings. First, perhaps Peter didn’t understand what Jesus was saying and just needed a better explanation. Second, perhaps Peter really did understand what Jesus was saying and didn’t like what he had heard. I think Peter understood and didn’t like it. That is why Peter tried to talk Jesus out of the rejection and suffering of the cross.
At this point, Jesus made a bold statement to Peter. Peter has been understood as the Rock of the church. Peter preached a bold, spirit-filled sermon at Pentecost from which 3,000 men and women became Christians. And, Jesus looked at Peter and said, “Get behind me Satan.”
Peter had become a tool of Satan without even knowing it. He didn’t want to work for Satan, but that is what he was doing. He tried to introduce a way for Jesus to avoid suffering and rejection. He didn’t want Jesus to go to the cross. He tried to impose the Jewish system of understanding the Messiah and perhaps convince Jesus to work in a way contrary to God’s original plan. And anytime we place human expectations above God’s will, we are inadvertently doing the work of Satan...By opposing God’s will.
Jesus said to Peter, “Get behind me.” I think Jesus was telling Peter that he had overstepped his bounds as a disciple. A disciple is supposed to follow his or her master. Peter was now trying to lead his master. Instead of following behind Jesus, Peter was trying to tell Jesus where to go. It is impossible for us to follow, if we insist on leading the way.
An interesting thing happens in the Greek text of Mark 8. Jesus used the same words to address Peter and to address the crowds. Jesus commanded Peter: “Get behind me.” Then, Jesus invited the crowd to become disciples by saying, “If anyone wants to follow behind me…”
This tells me that the very first step in becoming a disciple of Jesus is to get into a proper relationship with Jesus. Jesus has to be the leader. You have to become the follower. In other words, Jesus is in front. We are behind Jesus. Jesus leads the way. We will only go into the places where Jesus has already gone. For disciples of Jesus, there is no such thing as uncharted waters. If we follow Jesus, he leads us to places where he is already present.
At this point, I think it is worth noting that Jesus began his invitation to discipleship by demonstrating the voluntary nature of discipleship. No one is conscripted into becoming a discipleship. No one is drafted into Jesus’ army. No one is snatched into a relationship with Jesus against his or her will. NO! Jesus said, “If anyone wants…If anyone wills…If anyone desires…to become a follower…”
Then, Jesus made three points about true discipleship…

II. Deny Self.
Again, Mark 1: 1 tells us that Mark wrote his Gospel to tell us the “beginning of the Good News about Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God.” The Gospel is about Jesus. Everyone else in the book of Mark is a supporting character. In other words, Mark does not tell us the story of the Twelve disciples. Mark tells us the story of how the Twelve disciples relate to Jesus.
The First Century disciples serve as a model—or perhaps a picture—of what discipleship is supposed to look like in the Twenty-First Century. This picture of discipleship began with Jesus’ very simple call: “Come. Follow Me.”
When Peter and Andrew heard Jesus’ call, they were fishing. James and John heard Jesus’ call while they were repairing their fishing nets. Levi first encountered Jesus while he was counting the money at his tax collection booth. These five men were doing the things they were most comfortable doing. Then, one day, everything changed. Their lives were never the same again.
Jesus called them to enter into an uncertain, new life of following behind Jesus. When faced with a choice between the certainty of their past lives and an uncertain future with Jesus, these five men dropped everything. They left their old way of life and entered into a new life.
This is what it means to deny your self. To become a disciple of Jesus Christ, you must deny your self by leaving the things you are most comfortable doing and enter into a life that is no longer comfortable. Before you become a disciple of Jesus, you get to do anything you want to do. You are fully in control of your own life. But when you hear the simple call from Jesus—Come. Follow me.—you are no longer in control. Jesus is now in control of your life and your desires.
Discipleship is the same thing for us in the Twenty-First Century. We must leave our old way of life for Jesus. We must leave our past behind. We must give up any rights we think we have to own our future in order to hand the future over to Jesus.

III. Take Up Cross.
This is one of those expressions that has lost its “shock value” over the past 2,000 years. There wasn’t a single person in this sanctuary who was offended when I read this Scripture. That would not have been the case in the original, First Century setting. First Century people would have immediately remembered the gruesome scene of lifeless criminals hanging on crosses on the side of the “interstate highway.” Perhaps they would even remember watching condemned men agonizing under the weight of a cross-beam, walking through the city streets.
It was a typical practice for Roman executioners to force criminals to carry their own crosses to the place of execution. It was a part of the shame of crucifixion. Everyone could watch. Everyone could ridicule. Everyone could experience the terror of the Romans. Yet, Jesus said this shame and humiliation is a part of being a disciple.
We can interpret this in two ways. I think both of these interpretations are correct. First, Jesus’ life was headed toward a literal Roman cross. And we know now that most of Jesus’ original disciples faced extreme suffering and humiliation just because they were followers of Jesus. This tells us that we will not have an easy life just because we are Christians. We can expect to face the same kind of life that Jesus and his disciples faced. We will face the sufferings of the human life, and we will suffer for our faith.
Second, we can build on the image of a condemned criminal carrying his own cross. As the criminal was marched through the busy city streets, everyone who saw him knew that he was headed to his own death. He was a “dead man walking.” That is what it means to be a Christian. Your life is over. You can no longer live for your own desires. You belong to Jesus. Your past is over, and your future is in God’s hands.

IV. Follow Jesus.
Throughout the Gospel of Mark, this is the primary characteristic of a disciple. Outside of the New Testament, disciples were students and learners. For Jesus, disciples are followers.
In a very literal sense, this means that we should go where Jesus goes and always stay behind him. In a figurative sense, this means that we should do the things that Jesus has demonstrated for us. In a spiritual sense, this means that we should conform our lives to the life of Jesus. We should live like Jesus lives…Love the people that Jesus loves…Pray like Jesus prays…Preach like Jesus preaches…Desire what Jesus desires…And ultimately, give our lives away…

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.