The Sermon on the Mount XVI

Subtitle:  Revealing Areas that are Pitfalls for Hypocrisy III

Matthew 7:1-6.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on April 7, 2024.

We are going to look at the second area that is a pitfall for hypocrisy in our life today.  It is in the area of relationships with other people, particularly difficult people. 

Even when we hold people in higher esteem than things (see the last two sermons in this series), there are certain people that we have trouble loving, or even getting along with them.  This area of how we deal with difficult people in our life can set us up for becoming hypocritical.

Let’s look at our passage.

In our relationship with people (v. 1-6)

Most people in the world are very familiar with the first two words of Matthew 7:1.  They can quote these two words far quicker than John 3:16.  “Judge not!”  Or, a loose paraphrase, “Don’t be judging me!”  Of course, this is not the whole sentence, and the sentence separated from the context can be misleading.

Think about when you were a kid.  If you selectively picked words out of what your parents said, and pretended like that is what they said, would they be happy with that?  Parent:  “Son, under no circumstances are you to go to the party at Bobby’s house.  I know that his parents are gone for the weekend.”  Son thinks to himself.  “hmm.  Dad said “go to the party at Bobby’s house!”  No parent is going to accept that kind of selective hearing.  The son will be in trouble.  This is what many do with the Bible when they take those first two words as a shield for all manner of sins.  “Don’t judge me!”

However, this is not exactly what Jesus is getting at, and the rest of the verses make this abundantly clear.  Jesus gives us a maxim, or pithy saying, that is very general, but it gets you thinking.  Notice that the rest of the verse says, “Judge not…that you be not judged.”    There is a connection here between the first judgment and a second judgment that will come later.  The emphasis is not on a blanket statement of never making a judgment.  Rather, it is an emphasis your judgment being directly connected to a judgment that will come later.   It is better to see this as a strong warning that cannot be separated from the consequence of being judged yourself.  It calls for us to look down the road at how my current judgment of a person could affect my own judgment.

It's purpose is not to create a world where we never make judgments, but rather a world in which we are all very careful in the judgments that we do make.  It is sort of like a sign that says, “Road closed, bridge out ahead.”  Many people who take the time to read that sign will go a different route and save themselves a lot of time.  However, another person may read that sign and drive on by it, not because they ignored the sign, but because they considered it and recognized that their house is on this side of the bridge.  It is okay for them to drive by the sign.  Yet, notice that they will have taken the time to consider the sign and the warning it was giving.

Verse 2 drives home this point of a consequential judgment, which is what Jesus is really getting at.  Essentially, he tells us that we will receive back the kind of judgment and the measure of judgment that we give to others.  Thus, if you are tough in your judgments of others and you do it a lot, then expect a lot of tough judgments coming back your way.

This begs the question.  Just who is this future judge that Jesus has in mind?  We might imagine that he is simply saying that we should be judgmental to others so that they will not be judgmental towards us.  However, our life experience tells us that this is not how it generally works.  No matter how well you do something, there will be people who like it and people who don’t like it.   People’s judgments of you often have nothing to do with how you have judged them or others. 

Jesus is talking about God judging us, whether His temporal judgments during our life, or His eternal judgment at the end of our life.  Be careful how you judge people because you are going to receive from God the same kind of judgment, and in the same measures, that you gave to others.  Can you survive that?

This does not mean that we can cause God to judge that our sin is okay by not judging the sin of others in our life.  However, this ties to his statement, “Blessed are the merciful for they shall receive mercy.”  He doesn’t mean from others, but from God.  Of course, cursed are the unmerciful for they shall not receive mercy.

So he is concerned with how we judge and our quickness to do so.  We are not being wise and are not carefully thinking through what God might think about this.

In verses 3 to 5, we see that Jesus does not intend for us never to judge the actions of a person.  He is rather concerned with our hypocritical tendency never to judge ourselves the way we judge others.

I have actually had a co-worker come up to me and ask me to get a wood chip out of their eye.  He was working with a chainsaw, and a chip landed between his eyelid and eyeball.  There was no damage, but the eye was extremely aggravated, and he had been trying to remove it by himself for a while.   It was large enough that I was able to sweep it out with my finger.  I still remember his sigh of relief when I got it out.

This illustration of specks and planks that Jesus gives are actually about sins and faults that we may see in one another.  They are not good (literally or metaphorically), and life is better when they are removed.  Yet, we can be guilty of having great mercy, and seeing the best motivations, in all that we do, and then having no mercy for others (at least for certain others that we don’t like).

You may be correct in your judgment that they have a fault, or a sin, in their eye.  However, you could be overlooking the fact that you have something much worse going on in  your own eye (life).  This does present a comical image of a guy who has a board sticking out of his eye and telling his brother that he has a speck in his eye.  “Hey, let me fix that speck for you!”

Jesus speaks about our motivation.  “Why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye?”  What is going on in your heart and life that you spend a lot of your time judging the condition of others, but you don’t even take a second to consider bigger issues in your own life?  If we took just one second to consider our own faults and sins, it might make us a different person.

He also touches on the audacity of it.  “Or how can  you say to your brother, ‘Let me remove the speck from your eye’; and look, a plank is in your own eye?”  Yeah, just how are you able to justify such hypocrisy?  Don’t you know that God sees your poor job of acting righteous?

Only a person who has cleared their own eye (or asked another to help them do it) can help another person clear theirs.  First of all, you can’t see clearly to fix someone’s speck when  you have a plank in your own eye.  Even if you genuinely wanted to help, you would only make things worse.  The power of having dealt with your own sin is that it helps you to be far more sensitive and careful towards others, instead of harsh and uncaring.

Jesus is not leading up to saying that we should never judge.  He is actually leading up to saying that we should spend time on fixing ourselves first, and then we will be able to rightly help our brother.  That will end up being a way that pleases God instead of bringing down His judgment upon us.

Verse 6 may look like it is unrelated, if you don’t look closely.  Even when you clear your own eye so that you can help your neighbor, you still need wisdom.  You may have a perfectly clear eye, have helped a thousand people clear their eyes.  You may even be a professional doctor of getting specks out of eyes.  But, the other person may not be interested in you removing their speck.  In fact, they may not agree that they have a speck.  Perhaps, they simply don’t like you and don’t want you poking and prodding in their eye.  We need the wisdom of God that is supplied by the Holy Spirit in our life.

Jesus uses the images of dogs and  swine.  Dogs represented people who had given themselves over to wickedness.  They are people who give no thought to God and His ways.  Instead, they love to do the opposite.  Swine were connected to Gentiles who were separated from God.  These are both pictures of the spiritual state of individuals who surely have many specks and planks in their eye.  Yes, they need them removed.  However, they won’t take kindly to it.  They will end up trampling you if you aren’t careful.  If a person is not ready to be helped, whether that is a lost person hearing the gospel, or a Christian brother who is offended and doesn’t want our help, then we should back off and pray for them.

Notice that he pictures it as throwing holy things to dogs.  The holy thing is helping a brother or sister remove moral specks or even character specks in their life.  Holy places require special caution.  When you are going to meddle in the spiritual life of a person, always remember that this is a place that God is working on them.  You represent a holy God who is wanting to help them become holy.  It is a holy work.  You may want to remove your shoes and tread lightly.  This is God’s work and you can help him only by being sensitive to that.

A follower of Christ should be able to help others because they have been working on themselves, and they are being careful to be led by God.

Let me close by dealing with Jesus referring to some people as dogs and swine.  We can be quick to be offended, but he is not saying that people are born dogs/swine, and will always be such.  Similar to the parable of the soils, the point is not that we are stuck in categories.  Rather, that people may be ready, they may not be ready.  They may be repentant, or they may be given over to sin at the moment.  There is a timing of God that all people who want to help others would do good to heed.  Wait for it.  Pray for it.  In fact, you may not be the one who God uses to help them remove the speck.  However, you have still helped them by being a person who prayed for them, and were careful not to injure them through insensitivity to your own sin and insensitivity to their readiness to receive help.

May God help us to judge carefully and have His heart of love for others.

Pitfalls for Hypocrisy audio

The Proverbs-31 Man

Proverbs 31:1-9.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on June 19, 2022, for Father’s Day.

Today, we will focus on the Proverbs-31 man, and I don’t mean a man who is fortunate enough to marry a Proverbs-31 woman. 

No, we are talking about King Lemuel in verses 1-9.  You may even now be racking your brain trying to remember exactly who King Lemuel is.  This is the only place in the Bible where he is mentioned.  In fact, Lemuel means “king of the Lord,” or “king to the Lord.”

It is important for Christian men, and especially fathers, to focus on following the wisdom of King Lemuel’s mother so that we might be the leaders that He has called us to be.

Let’s look at our passage.

The path of a man who listens to wisdom

Proverbs is essentially written to supply wisdom for those reading it.  In this passage, we are given the instruction between a mother, and her son.  It seems most likely that Lemuel is remembering instruction that took place before he was to become king.  His mother took time to instruct him knowing that he would one day become king.  Perhaps, Lemuel is a nickname that is given to remind him that he is to be a king for the Lord, and not for selfish purposes.  It would be important for him to live, to walk, and to decide wisely.  You could say that the stakes are even higher because his life will impact and influence a whole nation.

It is interesting that wisdom is personified as a woman throughout the book of Proverbs.  This young prince receiving instruction from his mother is strengthened with the connotation that his mother represents wisdom.  All children need parents that will speak wisdom into their life and not folly- remember that folly is also represented as a woman.

As children grow, there is a manifold witness to them.  First, their parents attempt to teach them about life to one degree or another.  Second, a child should be introduced to the Scriptures by their parents.  It is the wisdom of God being witnessed to them.  Obviously, many parents do not teach their kids about the Word of God, so it is the duty of believers to share God’s Word with others.  This is an important witness to wisdom that God intends for them to have.  Third, life itself is the final witness to children about wisdom.  The rebukes of life are pictured in many proverbs.  As a child grows, lives, and makes decisions, they receive feedback from the world around them.

Of course, all kids will reach a point where they will have an adversarial relationship with the wisdom that has been given to them by others.  There will always be a part of humans that seeks to know for themselves.  However, the wise man is one who listens to wisdom.

The Past: We might be inclined to treat verse 2 as simply poetic address, but that wouldn’t be wise.  Lemuel’s mother addresses him in a way that emphasizes his connection to what has come before him.  She puts the question, “What?” to him three times with a different address each time. What is the lesson that she has for him?  She reminds him that he is first her son (and, of course, the son of his father).  She desires him not to only be her son, but even more to be a son of wisdom who lives wisely.  Kids must be instructed while they are young because these are the days when it is most clear to them that they need parents.  A wise parent will not wait until they think their kid is old enough to receive teaching.

Secondly, she addresses him as the son of her womb.  She went through sorrows and labored to bring him into this world.  Though a child didn’t ask to be born, they should still have a healthy respect for the difficulty that their parents, and ancestors went through to bring them into the world.

Lastly, he is a son of her vows.  This picture of a woman making a covenant, or vow, before God in order to obtain a child is all throughout the Bible.  Each of the patriarchs had wives who struggled to have children.  Of course, not all vows are about having children.  Still, she reminds him of her relationship with God and his existence as the proof of that relationship.

Wise men understand their connection to what has come before them in their parent’s home, their hometown, nation, and world.  We should humbly and wisely stand on the shoulders of the past knowing that those who created it are our foundation.

Women:  In verse three, Lemuel was warned about not giving his strength to women.  It is important not to make this say more than it is saying.  First, what is meant in the phrase “give your strength to women?”  Second, we should notice that it is “women,” a plural word.

It would seem strange for this proverb to be warning a man against women and then turn around to point out the quintessential woman, who should be desired by any man, in verses 10 and following.  You might see that proverb as an instruction of a parent to a daughter (be like this), or to a son (this is the kind of girl you want). 

“Charm is deceitful; beauty is passing, but a woman who fears the LORD, she will be praised.”  Finding a woman (singular) that is a good wife takes wisdom and prayer.  Spending the strength of your life with her to bring glory to God is a perfect picture of Christ and his Church. 

So, what is Lemuel being warned of?  He is being warned of focusing the mental and physical strength of his life on pursuing women (plural) and the pleasures therein.  Heaping up a harem of women will only destroy the good that a king can do.  What does it profit a man to have pursued and enjoyed many women in life, and yet to have lost his own soul?  Becoming king is not about getting everything your flesh desires.  It is about glorifying God and serving His People.  A good woman can be a strength to a good man when they are both focused on glorifying God in all that they do.

Intoxication:  Verses 4-7 highlight the error of intoxication.  A man who listens to wisdom is not trapped in intoxication.  Another image would be bitten by intoxication.  Proverbs 23:32-32 pictures wine like a serpent in the cup that stings those who drink too much of it.  “Do not look on wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup, when it swirls around smoothly; at the last it bites like a serpent, and stings like a viper.”  Lemuel’s mother warns him that it is important that a king not be given to drinking and intoxication.

Of course, the mother recognizes that there are situations where alcohol might be useful.  She states that wine should be given to those who are painfully dying, or those who are bitter of heart, so that they might forget their sorrow.  However, this is not projected as an answer for those people with any hope in it.  If you are painfully dying, or in the midst of bitter sorrow, God holds a better hope out to us than just alcohol. Yet, for our purposes here, this is not the point that Lemuel’s mother is making.  She is concerned that he not become a drinker.

Intoxication affects our memory.  We would forget the Law of God, and we might pervert justice that is our responsibility.  People who love their family sometimes become stuck in the grip of addiction.  Yet, the sad truth is that alcohol and drugs cause us to forget the thing we should remember.  Under their influence, we lose our inhibitions and do things that are harmful to us and the people we love.  How careful we should be in our lives when people depend on us. 

You might be inclined to protest that you are not a king.  In fact, as a Christian, there is a lost world out there that doesn’t even know that it depends upon Christians who walk soberly and work to bring the light of Christ into their lives.  People’s lives depend upon the decisions we make, whether wise or foolish.  Christ is the ultimate King, Prophet, and Priest.  However, we are to be learning to become more like him.  Therefore, there is a lesser sense in which we have a priestly, prophetic, and kingly duty to lead a lost world to the LORD!

Judging righteously and helping the needy:  Verses 8 and 9 give the true purpose of anyone who is in a position to affect others, whether a parent to a child, or a king to the people.  We should be a voice for those who are about to die before those who care not for their death, and may be even causing it.  This death may be literal or metaphorical.  Christ pleaded the cause of the lost before the religious leaders of his day.  With the woman caught in adultery, Christ reminds them of the gravity of executing someone for sin when you have sin in your own life.  Yet, Christ was not promoting adultery, or any fornication for that matter.  He tells her to go and sin no more. 

Nobody was righteous there that day, but Jesus.  The woman wasn’t righteous and the religious leaders were not righteous.  However, she was the one that no one was speaking up for.  God loved her and didn’t want her to die and go into eternity lost.  Open your mouth is repeated twice.  We cannot be silent, even when powers may attempt to silence us. 

Yet, we should not be shouting our truth to power out of self-serving motivations.  Rather, we are reminded to make righteous judgments.  In John 7:24, Jesus said, “Do not judge according to appearance but judge with a righteous judgment.”  It is not enough to plead the natural cause of the natural poor and needy.  Even greater is the problem of being in spiritual poverty, and being held in bondage by the powers of this world and our own sin.  May all Christian men aspire to be such a man as Jesus was because this is precisely the kind of man that Lemuel’s mother was instructing him to be.

Proverbs-31 Man audio

What is a Woman?

Genesis 1:26-27; 2:18, 20-22.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on May 08, 2022, Mother's Day.

[Note: There is no audio available for this sermon.]

We will take a break from our series in the book of Acts in order to focus on mothers today.

It has come to my attention that there are some people who do not know what a woman is.  Since, moms are first women, it is important for us to understand exactly what a woman is.  Now, if these were just kids who couldn't define what a woman is, then we could rest at ease.  However, these are full-grown adults who have graduated from our "best" universities that are having a hard time defining what a woman is.  We have reached a point in our society where the definition of woman is essentially: you will just intuitively know it if you are one.

Of course, the halls of academia and the philosophers of our age are purposefully breaking down the clarity that God has built within His creation, within reality.  For them, there can be no “mothers” in the future.  Only professionals can perfectly create and train the next generation.  Only smart people can know how many kids we actually need.  It is humorous that, for all of their great wisdom, God did not agree with them.  Instead, He made man and woman as we really are.  In general, He gave the power of creating and raising children into the hands of moms and dads, and not to professionals.  This intelligentsia is currently muddling the definition of men and of women (similarly to how they have been muddling the definition of family and marriage) to the point that men can now be considered women and even mothers.  However, this is just a transitional stage.  The end game is to destroy the whole concept altogether.  Men, women, boys, girls, families are all doomed by the purposes of the current intelligence running this planet.

Let’s go back to the beginning in order to understand what a woman is.

An essential part of imaging God

Humans are unique among all living things on this planet because we were created in God’s image and likeness (Genesis 1:26-27).  The Image of God, or in Latin the Imago Dei, is the essential difference between us and all other things.  Though evolutionists try to make man just another animal, it really doesn’t pass the sniff test.  There is something essentially different about humans and the Bible calls it the Image of God.

Throughout Genesis, we should recognize that the Hebrew word “Adam” starts out as a descriptor and only later becomes a particular name.  It can be used to mean the name Adam, or it can mean “a man,” or it can refer to “a human,” even “humankind.”  We should be careful reading maleness into the word in verse 26.  God did not say, “Let’s make Adam in our image…”  It is being used indefinitely and should be translated a “a man,” or “a human.”  Older translations that simply put “man” are using it to essentially mean human.  It is interesting that God states His intention to make “a human” and then the next phrase is “let them have dominion…”  Chapter one of Genesis pictures the individual and plural aspect of humans altogether.  It is not until chapter two that we are given an expanded look that emphasizes the maleness and femaleness of men and women.

We should note the plural aspect that is connected to God both in this verse and throughout the Bible.  It makes sense that God would design humans with a plurality, if we are to be made in His likeness.  Image and likeness are most likely being used as synonyms.  However, the word “image” is more of an external resemblance.  Whereas, “likeness” has a more abstract sense to it.  The image of God is not only connected to the male, but rather to humans.  The imaging of God is something that men and women have individually, but also as we operate together.

Women, you were made in the image of God in a unique way.  You must reject this androgynous notion where we work to erase all the differences between men and women.  To do so is to attempt to erase God’s image within us.  Women image God in ways that men cannot, and we image God together in ways that we cannot alone.  Your greatest value is not in being married or in having children.  Your greatest value is being an imager of God.

God’s purpose was to give humans dominion over the earth.  This too goes back to the image of God.  Just as God exercises dominion over the heavens, humans would be His representatives upon the earth.  The way in which we exercise such dominion is important.  We either rightly reflect God’s image in our dominion, or we image something other than God.  We are not to destroy the earth and its animals, and yet neither are we to elevate them above ourselves.

For today’s purpose, notice that it is both men and women who are to have dominion over the earth.  It pictures a side-by-side dominion of two beings, who are in the image of God, working together in one accord.

Verse 28 gives another command to humans (men and women).  They are to be fruitful and multiply.

This involves the sexual aspect of a woman and a man.  The woman, Eve, would also become Adam’s wife.  Together they would begin to populate the planet.  By the way, Adam and Eve had many children beyond Cain, Abel, and Seth. 

However, fruitfulness and multiplying are about more than reproduction.  What would God think of a family that had 20 kids, but never taught them the way of the Lord and how to be a righteous person like the one pictured in Psalm 1?  I doubt that he would say that they had done a pretty good job.

Fruitfulness would connect to how they tended the garden and how they exercised their dominion as they increased numerically.  Were they a blessing like a fruitful tree, or were they a curse like a poisonous berry?  Does life flow in our wake, or does death and suffering follow us all the days of our life?  Physical fruitfulness should be paired with the greater fruitfulness that is in harmony with the God we are to image.

In light of this, mothering is one part of what women do, and the birthing of babies is only one component of giving life to our children.  We should recognize that, in general, men and women pair up and marry.  Many of those go on to have children.  However, even Jesus recognized that not all are called or “given” to be married, and “given” to have children.  Matthew 19:12 says, “For there are eunuchs who were born thus from their mother’s womb, and there are eunuchs who were made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven’s sake.  He who is able to accept it, let him accept it.”  Jesus points out that there are congenital reasons why some people don’t marry in adulthood.  There are also times like kings and masters who have control over another person’s experience in life.  Lastly, Jesus recognizes that some people choose to be single for the sake of doing God’s will.  Like Paul who counseled Christians to give thought to the single life, Jesus recognizes that some can “accept this.”  A woman does not have to marry and become a mother to have value.  Those things are valuable, and moms need to know that as a wife and as a mom they are of great value.  However, those valuable things are on a greater, foundational value of being an imager of God.  Single people who never marry or have children have not fallen short.  Rather, they have chosen a path that only a small percentage are able to choose.  Even the single among us are able to participate in being fruitful upon this planet in both natural and supernatural things.

Genesis 2:18-22 pairs the concepts of aloneness and help.  Adam would be alone if it were not for the woman Eve.  God did not choose to give Adam a petri dish and the knowledge of how to create another “man.”  He gave Adam a woman.  She would help him in the gargantuan task of imaging God, being fruitful, and subduing the earth.  She was God’s answer for his aloneness.  Notice that God let Adam experience aloneness before he let him experience the help of the Lord.  This is another aspect of being in His image and separates us from the animals.

It is easy to think of Eve being a helper as a subclass.  The term in Hebrew is ezer and is seen in names like Eliezer (My God is Help) and Ebenezer (Stone of Help).  It is always used in the context of great need.  When Israel was under military threat, they needed help and were tempted to look to the Egyptians or others to be their answer.  All throughout the Bible, Israel is counseled to look to God as their help, and not other people, other nations.  Here are several examples.  Deuteronomy 33:26, “There is no one like the God of Jeshurun, Who rides the heavens to help [ezer] you, and in His excellency on the clouds.”  Psalm 146:5, “Happy is he who has the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the LORD his God.” 

The woman is to be God’s help to do something that would overwhelm the man who is alone.  She is representative of God’s help.  It doesn’t come in the ways that we would create, but in a way that God creates.

The woman also represents humanity as a helper to God.  Christ and the Church are described as the Mystery that marriage is representing.  In a strange way, humanity is the helper that God has created for Himself in a display of His wisdom.  He who is the ultimate source of any Help creates a helper for Himself.

These things are all at the core of what a woman is, and is the foundation of what every mom is.  May God help us to honor the mothers in our lives and help them to image God as we all should.

Obstacles to Reaching Jesus

Mark 2:1-12.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on March 17, 2019.

Although we will look at a story where Jesus heals somebody, this story is not so much about healing as it begs the question, What is our greatest need?  It positions a physical healing opposite the forgiveness of sins and questions if we would work so hard to be rid of our sins as we would to be rid of sickness or disease.

I could have entitled this as, “Obstacles to being Healed,” but that is not the true emphasis of the story.  Jesus is asking us to think about why we might come to Him and what really is our greatest need.  If we see Jesus only as a means to an end, then He simply becomes a gumball machine from which we get our gumball and then walk away.  However, Jesus has not left this option open to us.  Even being free of sins can become a means to an end if we are only seeking to assuage our guilt and avoid judgment.  We need more than physical healing and we need more than spiritual forgiveness of sins. 

Ultimately, we need a relationship with Jesus, who is the Lord of all those things and more.  Jesus is not a means to an end.  He is the end or goal for which we must desire and strive.

He had a physical obstacle

We do not know how long this man has been paralyzed nor how he came to be in that condition.  However, it would pose a problem to finding Jesus and asking for a healer.  At least the leper in the previous story could track down Jesus and catch Him on the road, but this man is debilitated to the point that he cannot do this. 

Yet, this man has friends who are willing to help him.  It is important in life that we have people who care about us enough that they will help us when we need them.  Of course, we too should be a friend back towards them, but friendship should not be about an equation of help. 

In this life it is easy to let differences and hurts lead us into isolation from the world, but we still need others.  We need others because we are not enough by ourselves and God desires others to help us.  He created us to be social creatures who work together for the good.  No one person has all the gifts, regardless of how talented they may be.  Eventually they will need others around them.  It is true that there are some people from whom we may be better off dissociating ourselves.  Yet, hurt can cause us to dissociate from people who don’t deserve it and to our own detriment. 

Still, no number of friends can replace Jesus in your life.  Thus, the best kind of friends are those who will help you to come to Jesus for all the needs in your life, not just healing.   Four friends determined to carry their paralyzed friend to Jesus so that he could be healed.

The crowds around Jesus were too large

When the paralyzed man and his friends get to Jesus, there is a problem.  There are too many people surrounding Jesus and they cannot get close enough to ask for help.  We are going to see later in the story that not all of these people are believers in Jesus.  These crowds are themselves a physical barrier, and yet they can also be psychological barrier to people who do not like crowds.  Some people are not interested in Churches and crowds of Christians.  Yet, they still need Jesus. 

In His humanity Jesus was often surrounded by crowds, but in His divinity, He is always accessible to those who will reach out to Him in faith, whether by themselves are with the help of a friend.  Don’t just limit yourself to inviting people to Church to hear the Gospel.  Learn to share Christ with people one on one, or in smaller groups of friends.

Notice that these friends are not easily daunted.  They don’t quit just because they run into an obstacle and it gets hard.  Instead, they devise a way around the obstacle, which involved tearing through the roof and lowering the man down in front of Jesus by ropes.  Their faith or belief that Jesus would heal the man stirred up a determination within them that wouldn’t quit.

Sometimes, whether individually or as a group, we can lose heart because we run into barriers.  If getting people to Jesus was easy then they would already be with Him.  No, this is a difficult job that is full of obstacles.  Am I determined to help my friends get to Jesus?  Of course, in our lives today the answer will not be tearing a whole in a roof.  However, may God help us to see the true barriers that keep our friends and family at a distance from Jesus.  Let’s continue reading at verse 5.

The man is a sinner

This story takes a turn with the response of Jesus.  Here is a man on his sick bed, lowered down by ropes in front of Him.  Yet, Jesus chooses to tell the man that his sins are forgiven.  This is important because it changes the story.  To the man and his friends, his greatest need was to have his paralysis healed.  To Jesus, the man’s greatest need was to be free from his sins.

Now, it is easy to let this story become cluttered with the intellectual trappings of healing.  We are not told if the paralysis was due to his sin.  So, we should be careful of making this about the need to have your sins forgiven before you are healed.  Jesus will go on to heal the man, but not because he now has his sins forgiven.  Jesus himself states that he healed the man to prove to them that He had power to forgive sins on earth.

There are many things that we need in life, some of which we only think we need.  However, they all pale next to the need to have our sins forgiven.  Our sins separate us from God and cause us to be guilty before Him.  We do not deserve His grace or His benefits.  We only deserve His wrath and judgment.

The statement of forgiveness in verse 5 is connected to the statement of Jesus in verse 10.  Jesus has the power (both authority and capability) to forgive sins.  As believers we can assist our Lord in helping people to be free from their sins.  This is their greatest need, whether they understand it or not.  What does it profit a man to be healed in this life, but not have their sins forgiven?  Yes, you would think that it would always be good to have both, but one is immensely more important than the other.

There was an unbelieving, religious community there

It is important to recognize that not all who surround Jesus, then and today, truly believe in Him.  You either believe or you don’t.  However, there is a tendency within us as humans to give up faith while attempting to keep remnants of religion.  It can be a security blanket, sentimentality, or even crass opportunism.  Without faith in Jesus, religion is dead and cannot help us, but with faith, religion can be pure and full of life. 

These religious unbelievers think that Jesus is blaspheming because only God can forgive sins.  However, they willfully forget that God had set up a whole system of priests whose job it was to perform rituals through which they could declare that people’s sin was now forgiven.  This delegation of forgiving was not blasphemy.  It was merely obeying what God had sent them to do.  They just weren’t used to seeing this outside of the temple compound and the priests.  Surely, Jesus must be blaspheming.  Yet, the priests over the centuries had been pointing people to the Lamb of God that would one day come in order to take away our sins, once and for all.  Jesus stood as the ultimate High Priest and declares that this man is forgiven.

This leads to a challenge from Jesus.  He asks them which is easier to say to the paralyzed man, Your sins are forgiven, or Arise, take up your bed and walk?  “Your sins are forgiven” is easier in the sense that it can’t be verified.  How can you know it actually happened?  It is not like you get a certificate in the mail stating that God has forgiven your sins.  Yet, “take up your bed and walk” is easier in the sense of actually doing it. 

Do we really understand that healing people is easier for God then forgiving their sins?  Healing is so easy that humans themselves are figuring out ways to get the cells and DNA to do what they are supposed to do in some situations.  I doubt we will ever get to a place where we have conquered all disease.  However, no man on earth has any power to forgive someone’s sin outside of Christ.  The obstacles to being set free from sin are legion: We can be paralyzed to even try and come to Jesus, We can fight with and reject those friends who try to bring us to Him, We can give up when we run into obstacles that make it hard, and We can even believe that our sins are too great to be forgiven.

I pray that today you will see the truth of this passage.  Sin is our biggest issue, and not just getting rid of it.  Sin itself is a barrier to the relationship that God intended for us to have with Him.  There is nothing more important in life than to have Christ declare over us that our sins are forgiven.  If you do not know Christ or you have friends that do not know Christ, I pray that you will not let any of the obstacles of this life and your own heart keep you from coming to Christ.  He will receive you with open arms if you will turn from your sins and run to Him.

Obstacles Audio