31st lesson in the Gospel of Mark. Of course, the last two lessons, 29 and 30, we focused on the heart. So we took a break from the verse-by-verse study and we paused and looked specifically at what the Bible calls our heart, the core of our being and how we need to protect it from becoming hearted. And we were looking there at the disciples in the boat at different times and different other, the Pharisees and other places in scripture where it speaks about the heart. And now we're gonna jump back into Mark 6 and we're gonna start in verse 53. So if you have your Bibles, please open them. Mark 6, starting in verse 53. We'll get to the text in a moment. I wanna start off with a question for you to think about. How much do you know about God? If you were to be asked to sit down and write down everything you know about God, what would be the contents of that document? What would you write? And most importantly, and this is where we're going today, our main theme, I believe, of this passage, is what difference is that knowledge making in your life? What difference does the knowledge of God make in your day-to-day practical life? A lot of knowledge is out there, and I know many of you have studied, read your Bibles for years, perhaps. But the question before us is, what difference is it making in your life? Our knowledge of God, who he is and what he is like, should be directly connected to our actions. Our actions in our life, our actions for God. Our knowledge of God should be directly linked to our action for God. In fact, in the Bible, knowledge and action are almost always inseparable. They're almost always connected. And so as we look at this passage, we need to understand the Bible assumes that when one receives knowledge from God about God, it will directly be preceding one's actions in living in accordance to that knowledge. The Bible seems to point us in that direction. The more knowledge we receive, the more it should influence how we live. So the question is, do our actions reflect our knowledge? Or is there a disconnect that needs to be reconnected? I think the text this morning, I believe, not just think, I really believe that the text bears this lesson out. We need to learn about God, and that is great. But the reason is so that it will directly influence how we live. or should be a direct connection. So I'm gonna start reading there. And it's just these four verses, Mark 6, 53 to 56. So please follow along with me. When they had crossed over, they came to the land of Genesaret and anchored there. And when they came out of the boat, immediately the people recognized him. ran through that whole surrounding region and began to carry about on beds those who were sick to wherever they heard he was. Wherever he entered, into villages, cities, or the country, they laid the sick in the marketplaces and begged him that they might just touch the hem of his garment. and as many as touched him were made well. Did you notice all of the action words in that passage? Over and over it was repeated. They recognized, they ran, they carried, they heard, they laid, they begged, and they touched. Their knowledge of Jesus directly impacted their actions. In fact, everything these people did was a direct result of what they knew to be true about Jesus of Nazareth. And there's not even a hesitation. The text doesn't seem to indicate. Immediately, Mark's key word for this whole gospel of Mark, immediately, immediately they recognized him, and I think, safe to say immediately they ran, immediately they carried, immediately they listened and heard and laid and begged and touched. And this passage, we're looking at it by itself this morning because of the flow of the text, because we're going verse by verse and passage by passage, but it's so connected to the greater context that it lies within. So if you remember back, In the previous verses, we saw the disciples, they were sitting, they were actually out in the boat, and they're fighting against the wind, and Jesus comes walking on the water. And who did they think he was? What did they think they were seeing? A ghost. And we found out in verse 52 is because their hearts were hearted, because they never understood what the purpose of the miracle of the loaves, the feeding of the 5,000 was. Christ's own disciples did not recognize him and did not recognize his deity the way that they should have. But these people, this cross-section of the general population immediately recognized Jesus and took action as a result of who they knew him to be and what they understood about him. They had seen him much less likely than the 12 had. The 12 were with Jesus constantly, living with Him, eating with Him, traveling with Him, constantly being privately taught by Him. Parables to the crowd, explaining the parables to the 12. They had the front row seats. They were integrated into the ministry. They were constantly at Jesus' feet, but they didn't recognize Him. These crowds, many of whom had probably never even spoken to Jesus personally, immediately knew it was Him. The word recognized here, and I don't have it on the slide. The word recognize originally meant to be or become discerned clearly and distinctly or as true and valid, often with a personal acquaintance that necessitates a reaction. I know that was a long thing. I meant to have it on the slide, but think about that. To be recognized, to be seen as true, but often with a personal acquaintance that necessitates a reaction. That's what they saw when they saw Jesus. It's Jesus. It's Jesus of Nazareth. That means we are going to take action. We're gonna do something. The people's knowledge of Jesus necessitated a reaction, and that's all these action words that we're reading here in the text. So we cannot physically see Jesus today. But do we know him? And what difference is that making in our daily lives? The knowledge of Jesus necessitates a reaction. We should do because of who we know. There should be a direct link. Knowledge without purpose leads to pride. If all we're gonna do is gain knowledge, but it's not for a purpose, it doesn't have an outlet into our lives in a practical way, 1 Corinthians 8.1, Paul wrote this, now concerning things offered to idols, we know that we have all knowledge, knowledge puffs up, but love edifies. Now there's a greater context in that passage in 1 Corinthians 8 that we're not gonna dig into this morning, but the principle carries right through. Knowledge can lead to pride when there's no purpose for it, when there's no outlet, when it's not affecting anything in our daily lives. The purpose for the knowledge in 1 Corinthians 8 was love, that they would love others instead of just having all this knowledge and just kind of holding it within. In the text here in Mark, the purpose of knowing Jesus was receiving healing. And that's what we see these people doing. Now think about these folks for a minute that are immediately recognizing Jesus. What if these people learned about Jesus, they heard about his healings, they heard about the woman who touched the fringe, which we'll get to in a few minutes, the blind seeing, the lame walking, and they wrote it all down. They recorded it all. They had this whole Jesus library of miracles right on their bookshelf, and it was all the things that he did, and it stayed up there. And then they went to the sick in the lane, they told them about the miracles, and they never actually went to the action of bringing them to Him, or those that were sick heard that He could heal. They heard about this woman who touched the fringe and was healed, but they never took action. They just stored it up as knowledge. What good would it do them? Almost no good. It would only serve to puff up their pride. This is what I know about God. This is what I know about Jesus of Nazareth, that these things happen and He healed these people in these amazing ways. But what about you? That's the question here. And so these people, these people have shown us an example of using their knowledge of Jesus to take immediate action and the result was people were healed. We've seen this before in Mark, back in Mark 6.33, when the multitudes were departing many knew him and ran there on foot from all the cities. And actually I did have those things. Let's go to that passage. Many knew him and ran there on foot from all the cities. They arrived before them and came together to him. Okay, this is right before the feeding of the 5,000. Notice that the people knew him and they did what? What's the verb there? Ran. They ran there on foot. They recognized him. They had some knowledge. They'd taken notice of his patterns and his whereabouts, and this knowledge caused them to run from all the surrounding cities to Jesus. So as we grow in our knowledge of Jesus, the incarnate word, through the inspired written word, we must allow that to compel us to action. I believe that is the lesson in this passage. God does not reveal his knowledge for it to remain like dusty books on the shelves of our minds. He reveals his knowledge because it is actionable knowledge. We are to take action. We are to integrate it into our lives. Peter wrote about this in 2 Peter 3.18, where he instructed us, grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. to him be the glory both now and forever, amen. So the grace and the knowledge of Jesus should be evident in the way that we live. There's a connection. We should be changing and growing in this as the days and months and years go by. And Peter had already written this earlier in his epistle, back in chapter one, verse three, he said, he wrote this, of course, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, as his divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us by glory and virtue. So how is his power integrated into our lives so that we know how to live and how to live godly? It's through the knowledge of Him. The knowledge of Him, that's the key. So God's power is contained in His knowledge. And this power, it's practical power. It pertains to the daily lives that we're living. And so we are to pursue it. God expects us to grow in our knowledge of Him so that we can grow in our power from Him. That's what I believe these folks are teaching us. And I think I skipped my first number of the outline, so let's go back here. Because all of that was that we were to, number one, if you're taking notes, I just put this up here, grow in the knowledge of Jesus. Grow in the knowledge of Jesus. That's what we need to be doing constantly, growing in our knowledge of him so that it can affect how we're living. So that's point number one. I'm jumping all around here this morning. These people gathered around Jesus, and that's what we're supposed to be doing. So they grew in their knowledge of him, and then they gathered around him. In Mark 6, 55, in the first part of verse 56, they ran through that whole surrounding region and began to carry about on beds those who were sick to wherever they heard he was, wherever he entered into villages, cities, or the country, They laid the sick in the marketplaces. So all these actions because of Jesus' presence. I wanna jump first of all to the beginning of 56, because it kind of gives us a picture here. Mark is, as he's writing about this in this passage, he's taking the timeline and he's compressing it into four verses. Because what we're reading about is actually probably a somewhat lengthy length of time, if you will, in Jesus' ministry. Notice that he was, this was a big part of his traveling ministry. He traveled into villages, plural, so multiple villages, multiple cities, or even out in the countryside, maybe in between some of the cities and the villages. So what we're reading about this morning took place over a longer period of time. Maybe it was, I can't imagine it'd be less than a week. Maybe potentially multiple weeks of ministry. So we're seeing this not just happen one time, like the feeding of the 5,000. This is happening over and over and over and over and over again. Wherever he entered, they were doing these actions because of their knowledge of him. So we kind of have that as our background. This is what's going on. And notice again, the action words, they ran, they carried, they heard, and they laid. So these people understood Jesus' abilities, and they knew something about his actions, and they had heard some things that he had done in the past. They'd seen the evidence, and by faith, they acted upon it. Notice that these people did not demand a sign from Jesus. They didn't come in pride. They didn't come in fear like the disciples. They understood what he could do, and by faith, they brought these people to him. And by faith, the people were touching his garment. By faith, they believed that he could heal them. They didn't demand a sign. They had already seen and heard enough. That was Jesus of Nazareth getting out of the boat. Nothing else mattered. Oh, it's Jesus. Instantly, we're gonna take action on that. It made me think about, and I'm not the first one to ask this question, but it made me think about it. I've heard others say this. What if Jesus was physically on earth today? What if he was? right here in the auditorium physically, or in your home if you're watching today, and he's sitting there on the couch with you, what would we do differently if he was physically available on earth? What would we do differently than we do right now? What difference would it make, Jesus' physical presence on earth? And I know it's a what if question, and sometimes those aren't as helpful. But I think the truth is, once the newness begin to wear off, I think that we might find other things, and I think that the way that we treat our Bibles is the way we would treat Jesus if he were here. The way that we treat our Bibles, I believe, is the way that we would treat Jesus if he were here. He is the incarnate word of God, but we're holding in our hands the written word of God. I wanna go to another gospel. Let's go to Luke. So turn with me. I don't have these up on the screens. Luke chapter 10. And we're gonna start reading in verse 38. Luke chapter 10, verse 38. Oops, that's chapter 11. That's why it didn't make sense. Luke chapter 10, verse 38. Now it happened as they went that he entered a certain village, and a certain woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who also sat at Jesus' feet and heard his word. But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she approached him and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore, tell her to help me. And Jesus answered and said to her, Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things, but one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part which will not be taken away from her. I think I like to tell myself, well, if Jesus were here, I would just stop everything and everything I'm doing and just sit at his feet all the time, like Mary did. But knowing me the way I do, I think eventually, and I don't know what's true about you, but eventually other things would become distracting. And I think eventually find excuses to slip away, to do things, even good things. Even things like Martha was doing, good things. She was serving, she was helping, she was preparing. Even churchy things, ministry things. But Jesus said in the passage that one thing is to have the highest priority, which is gathering around Jesus and learning from him. Now obviously God understands that we do have jobs and families and life and things and we need to enjoy some of the hobbies and pursuits of this life. It's not that we're to be in our Bibles 24 hours a day, seven days a week. But it's about the priority. What is the highest priority in our lives? I love the promise here. for Mary, and I think for us as well. He said, Mary has chosen that good part. And what's the promise? Which will not be taken away from her. When we make the good choice, the good part of gathering around Jesus in his word, it will not be taken away from us. When we choose to meet with God on a regular basis, on a daily basis in his word, he will meet with us. He will not waste that time. He will not make any time, no matter how long or how short, spent in his word a waste of your time. It might take a little bit for your emotions to catch up with your actions, because sometimes they're out of sync. And that's true of our prayer life. Sometimes it just doesn't feel good to pray, because we're just troubled or distracted. Sometimes it doesn't feel good to, again, pull the Bible off the shelf, open it up and sit down and read it on a daily basis. It's not always gonna feel super warm and fuzzy. But it's still so important, and God will not take away what we need to learn from it. He will meet with us when we meet with him. That's the promise. We've been, I say we, mostly Pastor Rich, but I'm right beside him on this. This is so key. We've been pushing this campaign for biblical what? Literacy. It's so important that we know what this word says. And in our passage today, in these texts, biblical literacy equals Jesus literacy. How we understand Jesus is directly related to how we understand this book. We must be biblically literate so that we can be Jesus literate. If you want to know your savior, you must be in his words. And this is not said to like chastise anyone or guilt trip anyone, that's not what it's about. It's really to encourage you, because I know many of you are faithful. But if you needed that encouragement today to get back into the word and to be refocused, we have this new year starting, sometimes that's a fresh place. You don't have to wait till then, you just start today. God will not take it away from you. It will not be taken away from you. the joy of being Jesus literate. I wanna read one verse. This I kind of stuck in yesterday, because I was reading through Acts again, and there's a lot of passages that talk about this principle of Jesus' literacy and how the word points to Christ. But in Acts 13, 27, Paul has been preaching and he's actually at the Pisidian Antioch. So this was like the northern, northwestern part of Asia Minor, I believe. I think that's right. But in any case, he's been preaching and he says this. Listen to, he's explaining what happened when Jesus was in Jerusalem and was tried and sentenced to death. So Acts 13, verse 27. for those who dwell in Jerusalem and their rulers, notice, because they did not know him, nor even the voices of the prophets, which are read every Sabbath, have fulfilled them in condemning him. Do you see the problem that the rulers and the Pharisees had with Jesus? They weren't biblically literate. They didn't see him for who he was because they didn't have the knowledge of the word of God. They did not know him. They did not know the voices of the prophets. If they would have carefully studied the prophets like Isaiah that was read this morning in the program, Jeremiah, all of them, point to Christ the Messiah in some way and compared, diligently compared, Jesus and his ministry and his life with what was written in the word, it would have been so clear to them. But they were not biblically literate. Jesus told the scribes, you look to the scriptures because you think that's where you get eternal life, but it's the scriptures that speak of who? and he was speaking in the first person, he said, me. Do you remember on the road to Emmaus, he begins this walking Bible study of the Old Testament, and beginning with Moses and the prophets, he opened their eyes and their hearts and their minds to understand how all of that was pointing down to one singular person, Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah of the Jews, our Savior. He used the scriptures to point to himself. So if we don't know what is in the written word, we will never really know the incarnate word. We must understand it if we're gonna know who Jesus is. Finally this morning, I wanna see that these people grasp onto Jesus. Grasp onto Jesus. Just to review. First of all, we saw that we needed to grow in our knowledge of Jesus. Then we see that we need to gather around Jesus and we don't do that physically like Mary did and like these people did. We do that physically with the word, the written word of God. And now number three, we need to understand that we need to grasp onto Jesus. The final part of verse 56. and begged him that they might just touch the hem of his garment, and as many as touched him were made well. Now, why the hem? Why do you think they wanted to touch the hem? What had they heard about that had happened in Capernaum? The woman. The woman with the hemorrhage. And how long had she been hemorrhaging? 12 years, 12 years of her life dealing with this. She had spent all her money on all the best doctors, and she only got worse. But when she touched the fringe of Jesus' garment, she was healed. This word must have spread like wildfire. And do you remember the scene? Because does she come to Jesus openly and ask for this? She literally, had to have crawled on her hands and knees through the legs of all the people that were crushing in around Jesus. She didn't want to make him unclean, because she was unclean. Spiritually, if you will, not spiritually, but in their customs. Ceremonial, thank you, that's the word I was looking for. She was ceremonially unclean. She didn't want to, embarrass him, embarrass herself. So she crawls on her hands and knees and reaches out in the midst of all the turmoil and the noise and the heat and the pressing of the bodies. And she just touches that fringe and she's instantly healed. And of course, Jesus, what's his question? Who touched me? Peter's like, Lord, everyone's touching you. What do you mean? Oh, power went out for me and everyone clears. And here's this woman and she has to come forward and confess everything I was been bleeding for these many years, and all the doctors couldn't help me, and I believed in you, that if I would just touch the fringe of your garment, I would be healed. It was her act of faith. And so, because of that public proclamation, do you think people kept quiet about that, or do you think they told their neighbors what they saw that day? I mean, everyone was posting on Facebook, right? This is what was happening. Not literally. Not literally, but yeah, they were tweeting, I don't know. Whatever social circles they were in in the first century, they were using those and this word was spreading and it spread all the way to Genesaret. And people, they were hearing about this. He is so powerful and he is so righteous and good that we just need to touch the fringe of his garment and we'll be healed. The hem or the fringe, I don't think we talked about this when we went through that passage, but the hem or the fringe was in reference to the border of blue tassels worn by a law-abiding Jew on his outer clothes. Back in Numbers 15, 38, speak to the children of Israel. Tell them to make tassels on the corners of their garments throughout their generations and to put a blue thread in the tassels of the corners, so Jesus, Was a law-abiding Jew? He would have had that fringe, and that's likely what she touched. Our artist's rendition of what that might have looked like that day when she did that and was healed. But what did Jesus tell her? Was it the tassel that healed her? It was Jesus' power accessed by her faith. He said to her, back in Mark 5, 34, daughter, Your faith has made you well, go in peace and be healed of your affliction. So this act of faith, this grasping of faith, it wasn't the tassels themselves that healed the woman, it was the power of Jesus that was accessed by the faith of the woman. And this grasping onto Jesus was an act of faith, both here for the woman in Mark 5, but now the multitudes that we're reading about today in Mark 6. They were all acting on and by faith, choosing to grasp to Jesus instead of themselves, instead of the law, instead of someone else. They begged him, they begged him. Notice that word begged. It's a word of passion. It's not just a casual, hey, would you mind if I just kind of reach down? Now this was an impassioned plea. They were begging him passionately with great emotion, an impassioned plea from one person to another. That's what the word actually is. It's the same word that's translated preached when the Bible describes the passionate preaching of John the Baptist. which I found very interesting. Now these people weren't preaching at Jesus, but it's that same powerful passion that John the Baptist preached with. That's how they were begging Jesus. It means to implore someone for action. Please, please. The same word is used, if you remember, all the way back in Mark 1, when the leper comes to him and falls down on his knees before Jesus, and he begs him that he might heal him. The same kind of pleading is happening here. It's a cry of someone who knows there is no other option. I've exhausted all the other possibilities that, and apart from Jesus, there is no hope, there is no assurance. There was nothing apart from Jesus. They were hopeless, and they knew it. And that was the difference, that was the key. So many people today are also hopeless, but they don't realize it. They haven't come to that conclusion yet. They sincerely believe that they can make it on their own. And I'm talking primarily about unbelievers. They really believe especially in different belief systems and different things where they strongly and truly believe that by their good works and their religious activities and their church membership and going through baptism and taking communion, that they can enter eternity and be with God in heaven. They sincerely believe this, but it's all false. They haven't come to the end of themselves yet, you see. These people on Mark 6 had come to the end of themselves. They were done with everything else, much like the woman with the hemorrhaging. She had come to the end of all human effort, all human help. She knew Jesus was the only answer. So these crowds here in Genesaret in the first century AD, They stand in judgment of people living today in our modern era that refuse the offer of Jesus, that have not come to the end of themselves yet. And of course, there's also a lesson here for believers. We as Christians also need to grasp onto Jesus for our daily lives. Remember, our knowledge is supposed to affect our actions. It's supposed to be directly linked We must also realize that the Christian life cannot be lived successfully apart from Christ. We cannot do this life on our own. We cannot obey the commands of this book in our own strength, at least not in a consistent way. We might grit our teeth and pull it off occasionally. The blind squirrel does find a nut sometimes. But it's not gonna be consistent and we're gonna continue to suffer even though we're on our way to heaven. we might continue to suffer because of our living in our own strength. This is what Paul is encouraging and even kind of abrading the Galatians for in Galatians 3, 2, and 3. This only I want to learn from you. Did you receive the spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? It's kind of a obvious answer there. It's faith. Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect? Are you now being sanctified by the flesh? Obviously no, we're not. Our justification comes by grace through faith. Guess what? Our sanctification also comes by grace through faith. So, what is the, The goal then of our knowledge of the word, as we kind of come back to where we started, it should be spiritual maturity. That should be the goal. I want to grow in Christ. I want to grow spiritually. I want to be more mature starting 2024 than I was when I started 2023. I want to see measurable growth spiritually in my life. That should be our heart's goal. Spiritual maturity is our goal, and it is accomplished not by the measure of our strength, but by the measure of our surrender to the strength of Christ. The more we are willing to surrender to Christ and the Holy Spirit, please don't leave him out of the equation, the more we will grow in our spiritual maturity. And that's exactly what these people are doing. Now they're getting a physical healing, that's true. But they had to come to him by faith. It wasn't the tassels, it wasn't the fringe. It was Jesus that was healing them. And that healing power was accessed by their faith in him, not faith in his garments, Not faith in faith itself, but faith in Jesus alone. So what is your purpose for the knowledge that you have gained from reading the word and studying the word and coming to church and learning from the word? What are you doing with all of that? How is it impacting your life? So growing in the knowledge of Jesus is for the purpose of living out that knowledge in our lives. We're supposed to be doing something with it. It's supposed to be changing us. And gathering around Jesus is the pathway to growing in knowledge of him, and grasping onto Jesus is the act of faith when we rely on him. Not only for our eternal life in heaven, but also for the power to live out this part of our eternal life. If you're saved today, guess what? You are living your eternal life. You're just living the earthbound part of it. We often say eternal life, and we think of that's gonna start when I get to heaven. It already started. This body is gonna die, but you are gonna live forever in heaven, and you're already living that eternal life. So who's empowering you right now? Are you struggling? It might be because you're trying to do this personal life in your own strength. We need to grow in our knowledge of Jesus, gather around Jesus, and grasp on him in faith. Father, thank you, Lord, so much for your word. Lord, it is the only source of truth in the universe that we can go to to understand who you are. The Bible is our only exclusive source of knowledge. about you and about Jesus Christ, about the Holy Spirit, and about ourselves, Lord. We don't know who we are apart from knowing you and your word. So Lord, please, help us not to be like the man that James talks about who looked in the mirror and forgot what he saw. Help us, Lord, to look deeply into the mirror of your word as it exposes us for who we really are and exposes us to who you really are. And may that knowledge directly impact our lives, Lord. Help us to go out and live out the knowledge, Lord. Help it not to just sit there puffing up our pride, but help it, Lord, to engage into our lives as we minister to the people around us. Oh, Lord, please help us to be faithful to your word. Lord, you promised Mary it would not be taken from her, and you've promised us as well. Lord, not one minute in your word is a wasted minute. So help us to use those wisely and to be students of your word so we can be students of the Lord Jesus. I pray this in Jesus' name, amen.