Are you ready for the Gospel? I woke up needing those new mercies this morning. So will you please open your Bibles so we can hear the Gospel from Isaiah 56. Isaiah 56. Before we look at this text, let us go to the Lord in prayer. Heavenly Father, we come to You and we pray, enlarge in our hearts, that we may run in the way of Your commandments. We pray this in Jesus' name and for His sake. Amen. Now hear the word of the Lord from Isaiah chapter 56. Thus says the Lord, keep justice and do righteousness for soon my salvation will come and my righteousness will be revealed. Blessed is the man who does this and the Son of Man who holds it fast, who keeps the Sabbath, not profaning it, and keeps His hand from doing any evil. Let not the foreigner who has joined himself to the Lord say, the Lord will surely separate me from His people. And let not the eunuch say, behold, I am a dry tree. For thus says the Lord, to the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, who choose the things that please me and hold fast my covenant. I will give in my house and within my walls a monument and a name better than sons and daughters. I will give them an everlasting name that shall not be cut off. And the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to Him, to love the name of the Lord and to be His servants, everyone who keeps the Sabbath and does not profane it and holds fast to my covenant, These I will bring to My holy mountain and make them joyful in My house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on My altar, for My house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples." The Lord God, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, declares, I will gather yet others to Him besides those already gathered. It says, the Word of the Lord. Let me ask you, how thankful are you this morning that you are welcome here in God's assembly? Did you think to yourself as you pulled into the parking lot, I cannot believe that I can walk through these doors. Do you ever pause to let it just blow your mind that you are not only not a stranger and an outcast, but that you can walk in here and with cheeky boldness say to the Lord Almighty, Father. I ask these questions because I was convicted about how I don't get amazed enough about this. I know that the Jews in Isaiah's day, hearing Isaiah 56, this would have blown their minds. that God's coming salvation would result in Gentiles being welcomed in. Deuteronomy 23 had explicitly forbade eunuchs and foreigners from coming into God's assembly. Yet God was saying He was going to act in history what Israel was looking forward to, and the foreigner who joined himself to the Lord would no longer say, the Lord will surely separate me from His people. And the irreparably damaged eunuch would no longer say, I am a dry tree." In other words, I can't possibly bear fruit. The original readers were hearing a mystery. A mystery that one day God would bring outcasts to His holy mountain and make folks like us joyful too. Now, I'm under the assumption that none of us here are ethnically Jewish. God desired for His house to be a house of prayer for all peoples. Israelites, they knew that one day Gentiles would serve God. But there was always an emphasis on the nations serving Israel as they came to God, not being equal heirs. And what was mystery then, I think it should remain glorious mystery today. The coming of the true Israel whom all nations would serve. Paul writes in Ephesians 3 of the mystery of Jesus Christ. which was not made known to people in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God's holy apostles and prophets. This mystery is that through the Gospel, the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise of Jesus Christ. Beloved, the good news for you this morning is that you are no longer an outcast. The good news is that by believing in Jesus, repenting of your sins, you can bear much fruit in this life. Beloved, the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation, not just for the Jew, but now for the Gentile too. And you can rejoice this morning that because you have assurance that you will never be cast off because of what God has done, God the Father, at infinite cost to Himself in Jesus Christ, That's our assurance. That's our guarantee. And if angel minds, which have been considering this mystery a lot longer than us, if they're boggled by this mystery, I would encourage us to be boggled as well, that we should never cease to marvel at what God has done for us in Jesus Christ. Will you please turn in your Bibles to the Gospel of Mark. We're going to be looking at chapter 11, starting in verse 11. Now hear the word of the Lord from Mark 11, starting in verse 11. And he, Jesus, entered Jerusalem and went into the temple. And when he had looked around at everything, as it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the twelve. On the following day, when they came from Bethany, he was hungry. And seeing in the distance a fig tree and leaf, he went to see if he could find anything on it. When he came to it, he found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. And he said to it, May no one ever eat fruit from you again. And his disciples heard it. And they came to Jerusalem. And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold and those who bought in the temple. And he overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. And he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple. And He was teaching them and saying to them, is it not written, My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations? But you have made it a den of robbers. And the chief priests and the scribes heard it and were seeking a way to destroy Him. For they feared Him, because all the crowd was astonished at His teaching. And when evening came, they went out of the city. And as they passed by in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered away at its roots. And Peter remembered and said to Him, Rabbi, look, the fig tree that you cursed has withered. And Jesus answered them, Have faith in God. Truly I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, be taken up and thrown into the sea and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. Therefore, I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. And whenever you stand praying, forgive. If you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also, who is in heaven, may forgive you your trespasses. It says the word of the Lord, At first blush, this probably seems like a difficult text. We see that on this morning, Jesus woke up with a big time craving for some morning figs. And He sees off in the distance a leafy fig tree that holds forth the promise of a snack. But when He gets there, Jesus finds that there's nothing. And Jesus seems to act like one of us upon opening the cabinet and seeing a box of Fig Newtons and taking it up and discovering it's empty. Right? Jesus gets angry and starts cursing this tree. He curses this tree right in front of his disciples. Does this sound like something we would expect from our Lord Jesus? And what makes Mark's comment worse is he says it's not even fig season. What would you think of someone who comes home with tomato plants about this time of year in May and started screaming at them in the morning? Jesus would just return in a few months. He'd find this tree doing exactly what this tree was supposed to be doing. What gives? Now some biblical scholars, it's like they become amateur horticulturists trying to justify Jesus' actions, filling many pages with all their studies on this. They argue that the leaves there indicate that there should have been some underdeveloped, small, semi-edible fruits that Jesus was maybe hoping to snack on. The problem is Mark tells us there should be no expectations that Jesus should find fruit here. I read one commentator who was bold enough to say what he felt. This story does not ring true. To be frank, the whole incident does not seem worthy of Jesus. What's further puzzling, if you've been reading through the book of Mark with us, is that this last miracle of Jesus is quite different from the rest. He seems to use His power for His own sake. Plus, it is destructive instead of life-giving. as every other miracle has been. I appreciate that commentator who says, it doesn't seem worthy that Jesus cursed this poor fruitless fig tree, because it makes Jesus seem petty and out of control. But while Mark gives us a Jesus who is often difficult to understand, Jesus is never out of control. Jesus is never out of control. Did you notice that Mark actually gives us this fig tree story in two parts? You actually have the cursing of the fig tree in verses 12 to 14, and then the discovery that it's withered later on in verses 20 to 25. And right in the middle, you have this scene of the temple judgment. Mark mashes these two stories together, the temple and the fig tree, because he wants us to see that these are connected. And he does this frequently, which commentators call sandwiching. The story in the middle is best understood only when you take in what is on the outside. The point Mark is making is that the temple, like the tree, appears to be thriving, but while it holds forth the promise that you see, it's bearing no fruit. It's bearing no fruit. For all the pomp and show of the Jew's glorious temple during Passover, The temple goers here are posers. They're putting on a show. And we see by Jesus' anger, He is not pleased with worshippers who go through the motions. This is a difficult, serious text. This text is saying with no uncertainty that this is a matter that is serious for believers. Jesus is hungry to see God's people bearing fruit. And that's the theme of our text. We ignore to our own peril Jesus' passion for fruitful lives and particularly love of our neighbors. We ignore to our own peril Jesus' hunger that we bear fruit in life. And especially He wants to see us love our neighbors. But the good news, the good news is that if we turn in faith to Jesus, God will forgive us and He will make us fruitful. If we turn in faith and reach out and grab a hold of Jesus, we will bear fruit and we will be pleasing. I noted that Jesus is never out of control in Mark. And that's actually why I read verse 11, which takes place the previous day. Following His triumphal entry, we see that Jesus entered the temple and He looked around. And the Greek verb here conveys the sense that Jesus looked intently with great personal interest. Jesus would have seen all the things that are taking place this next day, the night before. This initial visit, we see He doesn't explode because this is reconnaissance here. Jesus is preparing, planning what He's going to do the next day. This temple area was actually a massive structure. It comprised about 35 acres. So Jesus would have had to send some serious time here to take it all in if He's looking intently with great personal interest. The text actually notes it's late when Jesus finally returns to Bethany. Jesus saw everything that was taking place here and He made a plan of what He was going to do. No doubt Jesus was in prayer to His Heavenly Father that night. I think perhaps He may well have been fasting. Maybe the reason why He was hungry the next day when He sees that fig tree, which He knows will provide His disciples with a crystal clear illustration of what He's about to go do in Jerusalem. And I say crystal clear because the symbolism here would not have escaped the disciples like it might us. You see, the Old Testament is full of language of the nation of Israel being compared to a fig tree. Hosea 9.10 speaks of God finding Israel like the first fruit on a fig tree. We sang Habakkuk 3, which compares Israel's exile to a fig tree that does not blossom. Pastor Peter is actually preaching tonight on Haggai 2, which does the same thing. The fig tree was a symbol that embodied Israel, who they were. The disciples would see this fig tree in a somewhat similar vein to how Americans see the bald eagle, a symbol of the nation and its ideas, what it stood for. So imagine what they would take in as Jesus curses this poor, fruitless fig tree, and then sets His face to go to Jerusalem and the temple. Verse 15, And they came to Jerusalem. And He entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold and those who bought in the temple. And He overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. And He would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple. And He was teaching them and saying to them, Is it not written, My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations? But you have made it a den of robbers. and the chief priests and the scribes heard it and were seeking a way to destroy Him, for they feared Him, because all the crowd was astonished at His teaching." This explodes the myth of Jesus meek and mild, doesn't it? Jesus is drawing attention to Himself by picking a fight here with the religious leaders. For ten chapters, Jesus has been hiding His identity because it's not time. But this last section of Mark, Jesus is now picking a fight because it's time for the passion, time for Him to die for Israel's sins and for our sins as well. Now, folks previously had perceived Jesus to be a prophet, to be like a John the Baptist or another Elijah. But Jesus is saying, no, I am far more than a prophet. In the first part of this chapter, he rides up to Jerusalem on a colt like Solomon did. He's proclaiming, I'm not just a prophet, I am the king. And now he shows himself to be a priest, the priest of God in the temple. Jesus is cleaning house here because it does not resemble the place where God dwells with His people, where folks could find forgiveness of sins, could find peace with their Maker. Jesus found it was more like a bazaar or a marketplace. You had the temple tax to pay when you came in, so Roman currency was being exchanged here. Because it would be really hard for a lot of these Jewish pilgrims traveling here to bring sacrifices over long distances and not get injured or blemished in some way, there are lots of sellers of sheep and pigeons, and I mean lots, Contemporary historian Josephus, who may exaggerate things, but he writes that over 250,000 sheep were slaughtered during Passover. Can you imagine all the markets that Jesus saw here? So is Jesus angry because people are profiting wrongly here, taking advantage of people? Perhaps, but Mark doesn't mention that here. Jesus is actually driving out both those who sell and those who buy. And Jesus is also stopping people from carrying anything through. You see, some folks are using this as a shortcut to get across the city. I think this scene must have been pretty astonishing to see. I would love to have seen it. Because Jesus is just one man, and He's playing priestly defense, like over several football fields at the same time. He's not letting anybody through. He's also preaching to the crowd, quoting from Isaiah 56, that God's house was to be a house of prayer for all the nations. And that's the first reason Mark gives us for why Jesus is angry. You see, everybody had set up shop in the only place where the Gentiles could worship God. There were several divisions of this temple. Of course, you had the most holy place, then you had the holy place, then you had the area for the priests, and then you had an area hall for the Israelites. Then you had the part for the women, the court for the women, where they could go. And then at the very outside, at the very outskirts, you had the place where the Gentiles could meet. This was as close as the Gentiles could get to the God they wanted to serve. Now it was a marketplace. The religious leaders did not care that their activities pushed the Gentiles out. So Jesus pulls down the facade to show these folks that the temple was meant to be a place that showed God's welcome to the nations. In fact, God had come to dwell with Israel for the sake of the world. And Mark adds that Jesus is further angry, because it had become a den of robbers. This is a quote from Jeremiah 7, that famous one where he says, you call this the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord? Jeremiah says no, and he condemns the Jew for calling the place, God's temple, a place of their salvation, a refuge, where they could go and believe that they were safe here, offer their sacrifices, but then they could walk out and live just as wickedly as they were the day before. They thought God did not see them. In this day, the temple had become a place where rebels could flee and think they were safe. So Jeremiah tells them that God is bringing judgment, which in Jeremiah's lifetime happened. Both Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed after he said this, which is what Jesus is showing us here. This is not so much a temple cleansing, as you may have a subtitle there for, This is a temple judgment scene. Jesus is giving a preview of what's going to befall Jerusalem and the temple, because Israel and especially its leaders were failing to bear fruit in keeping with the repentance and bringing the offerings and the sacrifices. And these two reasons Jesus judges Israel provides, yes, serious warnings for the church today. We better be making room for our neighbors. We better be making room for outcasts, for those who are needy here in the church. We can look really worshipful. We can be really faithful to good traditions, and yet become insensitive to those who are on the periphery. And thus we become fruitless, and we stand under God's judgment, just like Israel. Paul says, we Gentiles can be cut off just as easily in Romans 11, for if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will He spare you. Plus, we cannot think that we're in good standing simply because we were raised in church, because we know our catechism, because we're on a lot of church committees. If we walk out of here and fail to live out our profession of faith before a watching world. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 6-9, Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the Kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the Kingdom of God. And such were some of you. That's the good news. You were washed, Paul says. You were sanctified. You were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. We have been redeemed by Jesus to live anew. That's what we heard in our declaration of pardon. So we can't come to church on Sunday and confess our sins and think we're all good after hearing that declaration of pardon. We have no intention of leaving here and bearing fruit in keeping with that repentance. looking how we can better love God and the neighbors that He sets before us this coming week. You can't walk out of here looking really leafy without plans to be really fruity, really fruitful in your life. And that's not fruit in your season. Two months from now, Jesus wants to see figs on you this week. Bearing fruit this week. There's no safety in simply being a church member. is looking intently with great interest at you this week. And Jesus is far angrier at fruitless believers than He is at fruitless unbelievers. Do you believe that? Because what happens is hypocrisy actually covers up God's grace. It covers up and it makes God's grace look like it isn't real for sinners, of which we all are. And I think we can dig deeper into what goes on in our hearts by noticing how these chief priests and scribes react. They hear the teaching of Jesus and they begin seeking for how to destroy Him. Why? Because they feared Him. They feared Jesus because the crowd was astonished at His teaching. Jesus is saying first, God loves Gentiles and wants His house to be full of them. And second, Jesus is challenging their authority by saying, you're no better than Jeremiah's day, and you know what's coming next. Do you see what's going on in their hearts? They hear Jesus preaching the Gospel, but they're not convicted by their sin. No. They fear losing what they trust in. Their functional Savior is their high position in society. That is their functional Savior. That is why they reject the Gospel that elevates Gentiles. It's their status in the Kingdom of God. They don't like that. Throughout Mark, religious leaders, they look down on sinners. And they trust in all their good works, how moral they are in front of the people by their law-keeping. That's what they trust in. They build a foundation on the idea that God loves them because they're morally better than all these other people. They construct a positive image of themselves in the eyes of others which becomes then the basis for their acceptance before God. And don't we do this too? I know I do. Don't we look at our leaves? Don't we look at our church attendance? Don't we look at others' foolishness and then think how well we have our act together compared to them? And from this we find some assurance? And don't we do the other thing? We minimize it when we do sin? I know I shouldn't have lied to my spouse, but she's really sensitive, so I did it for her sake. Or, oh yeah, I was cruel to that person at work, but I've got a bottom line here. A lot of people to care for. Yeah, I fudged on my taxes, but you know what? I'm going to give extra to God this week. He'll be pleased with me. And we build a foundation that I'm accepted because I'm a pretty good person. God loves me because I'm a pretty good person. And this is the wrong foundation to build upon, because our only cure is the gospel of Jesus Christ, the grace we see at Calvary. These religious leaders lost that God set his love on Israel when they were slaves in Egypt, when they were rebels in the desert. And we're prone to forget that while we were still sinners, while we were God's enemy, Christ died for us then. Beloved, the good news is that we're not saved because of anything in us. Praise be to God. That our only foundation is solely who God is. We find our salvation outside ourselves because God is a God who loves and graciously pours out His grace upon sinners. The problem comes because even after believing, we find that we're still prone to two things, fear and pride. Fear of man and pride, which are two sides of the same coin. And the thing is, both of these can make it appear like you produce good fruit. Do you realize that? If you think about it, actually that's how God keeps this world from spinning out of control one of the ways. Folks fear what others think of them. Or they fear that they'll get caught if they do bad things. So out of fear, they live virtuous lives. And folks out of pride, they strive to do good so they won't look like those other bums. And so they run around saying and doing good things so that they can keep their status. Everyone will think they're great. But we see here what happens when you bend our hearts because of fear or because of pride. These religious leaders, they stopped believing in God's grace for them as sinners. And as a result, they became unable to believe that God's grace could extend then to other sinners. And they're so afraid here that the folks are going to see through the facade that they put up. They begin to plot the greatest evil that mankind has ever committed. Do you see what happens when you operate out of fear of man and out of pride? It only works for so long and it's not real fruit. We can't lose the joy of our first love. That God accepts us despite all of our shame and all of our sin. God loves you because He loves you. And there's no getting beyond He loves you. That's it. There's no because. It's just who He is. He loves you. Because He's a God of grace. And when you fully appropriate that God loves you in all of your mess, when you take in from the top of your head all the way to the soles of your feet that you are accepted completely, you actually won't go lightly on your sin. It's the opposite. Rather, you will find that you can admit all your problems to God because you know you're accepted and you can find healing in that. That is why Paul says the Gospel is the power of God into salvation. Not that it causes the power of God, not anything else. It is the power of God. The implication is that you will bear fruit to the degree that you get a hold of God's grace, to the degree that you take in the Gospel. So it is no surprise that our next scene is about taking hold of God's faithfulness. Because that is how we can turn from fear and pride in this life, and how we can then bear fruit. The next morning, they passed by this fig tree and they discovered, wow, it's gone, it withered. And Peter remarks in verse 21, Rabbi, look, the fig tree that you cursed has withered. And Jesus answered, have faith in God. Have faith in God. I invite you to slow down just for a minute. Let's slow down to really consider what the disciples are taking in at this moment. They're standing in front of a dead fig tree that they know represents, that embodies Israel, that embodies the temple, all that Israel is. This would be more impactful than American soldiers standing over a dead bald eagle, okay? Though there's no separation of church and state for these guys, this is far more. The day before Jesus cursed this tree, and then immediately after, He gave a temple judgment preview. And it's likely when they return to the temple today, they're going to find the same things return to normal. It's going to be back to bizarre. For 11 chapters, they have seen the power of Jesus' Word to give life. And now they see Jesus' Words also have power to bring death and destruction. Jesus is saying this temple, that not just they have known, but their fathers have known and their grandfathers have known. And for centuries, everyone has looked to this temple. All its history, with all its associations of Israel's unique favor with God, it's going to be gone, destroyed. These disciples would be stunned. So Jesus says exactly what these disciples need to hear at this moment. And exactly what we need to hear When we are facing the miseries of this life, have faith in God. But I believe this is better translated in the possessive sense. Take hold of God's faithfulness. In the midst of what you see is going to happen, in the midst of miseries, take hold of God's faithfulness. Jesus is saying, I know your hearts are quivering as you see what's coming down the pike. But Jesus is saying, take hold with both hands to God's faithfulness in this moment. Jesus is saying that earthly things, they can't sustain you. So trust that God will. And then Jesus says, truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, be taken up and thrown into the sea and does not doubt in his heart, but believe that what he says will come to pass. It will be done for him. Therefore, I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, Believe that you have received it and it will be yours. Jesus has just spoken judgment on the fig tree and the results are clear. And now with the temple mount overshadowing them and disciples, Jesus says that the one who says to this mountain, this mountain, be taken up and thrown into the sea, can be assured that it's going to happen. And Jesus will speak a word against this temple in two chapters. saying, not one stone will be left. And within a generation, Rome will utterly destroy this temple. I believe that Jesus is referring solely to Himself as the mountain mover here. That Jesus alone is the one who did not doubt, which is why He speaks in the third person in verse 23, but then in verse 24, switches to the second person plural, speaking to His disciples. Jesus calls His disciples to go to God in prayer and have faith in like manner, believing that we will receive whatever we ask for. I like that. Whatever we ask for. Jesus says, whatever here, what popped in your mind? Suppose I can start praying for the White Sox pitching staff. If I believe enough, you're laughing, but if I believe enough, World Series, here we come. Though I make the funny because many name-it-and-claim-it preachers have preached this error in our day. But Jesus' assumption here is that we're going to be asking for things in the same vein as this mountain moving. That we will be praying through the lens of Thy Kingdom come. And this temple stood in the way of the coming Kingdom of God. Not only did it stand for all the wrong things and keeping back the outcasts, But the temple was merely just a signpost pointing to the reality that was to come in the incarnation. A new and lasting place where heaven and earth would meet when Jesus was conceived in the womb of the Virgin Mary by the Holy Spirit. The sacrificial system, as Peter told us, was just a pointer to the Christ who came to die, whose blood would truly and finally cleanse us of all our sin and shame. And the destroyed temple never to rise but cause us to look for the temple that did rise. As we hear in Mark 14, that Jesus said, I will destroy this temple that is made with hands and in three days I will build another not made with hands. Jesus' disciples then and now are being encouraged in the power of believing prayer. That prayer is the indispensable human instrument by which we can bring in the Kingdom of God. Do you believe that when you pray? That this is an instrument whereby we can see God's kingdom come in our own day? That we can take hold of God's faithfulness, praying confidently that God's kingdom come because God wants that done? Sure, we can pray for a new car, for a job, for a spouse. We can pray for whatever. But we need to have our eyes set on how we can join Jesus in our mission, in His mission. That's the point of how we should be praying. That's why we pray against false teachers in our day. That's why we earnestly pray for laborers, gospel laborers, to go out there and find the harvest that is there. We don't even have to pray for the harvest. It is there. Now, this sudden shift to prayer, it's not an odd intrusion into this scene. It may seem like it. But Jesus had just said that His temple was to be a house of prayer. Now he's saying that prayer must continue after that temple is destroyed. That's us. We are the new temple. And we are to be a praying community. And the disciples did this. We read in Acts 6, they devoted themselves to prayer and the ministry of the Word. So we must do the same. Praying that God will save the nations out there and the nations we find in our own backyards. praying that we might become instruments to tell them of the death and resurrection of Jesus, knowing that Jesus only came to save sinners, which means you can pray for everybody. Which also informs our posture as we pray, because we're all sinners. Jesus says in this last verse, and whenever you stand praying, forgive. And if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father who also is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses." Jesus concludes with a stern command to forgive and a remarkable encouragement I'm going to close with. First though, Jesus says when you pray, you must come with a posture, a disposition of forgiveness. There's no wiggle room here. Jesus says if you have anything against anyone, forgive. Does anyone come to your mind? Do you have remaining bitterness against anyone? Then Jesus tells you, you must let it go. Release it, which is what the word forgive means. Forgiveness means you have been harmed, but you forego the right to seek repayment. So yes, it means voluntary suffering. Voluntary suffering. If I break your window and you forgive me, you either have to live with a broken window or your cash flow gets hurt because you have to go out and pay for a new window. And yes, there may be far more suffering when forgiving a crime happens to be against your person in a bad way. But I want you to notice Mark has the vertical in view here. Not so much the horizontal, the vertical. I like that the ESV rightly says, forgive. The NIV adds, forgive them. But that's not there in the Greek. There's no pronoun here in the Greek. Jesus is talking about forgiving vertically when you go to God in prayer. And again, Jesus is saying that when you pray, you need to release to God everything you're holding against others. And as you let it go, take hold of God's faithfulness. Take hold of His faithfulness. as Jesus calls you, to the path of voluntary suffering. I think this might be how we actually bear fruit. It hurts when you get pruned, right? When you let that go. But that's actually how we can begin to bear fruit. And again, it's fear and pride that can impede our forgiving others. If you are fearful, if you live in fear and insecurity of what others can do to you, you will struggle to forgive. But if you grab hold of God's faithfulness and His love for you, and you begin to see that your lasting identity is now found in the resurrected Christ, you'll actually discover there is a limit to how much pain people can inflict on you in this life. And it's easy. On the other hand, with pride, it's easy to hold a grudge if you think you're above that sort of sin, which actually reveals you are blind to what lies in your own heart and what the suffering Christ had to endure so that you could be forgiven. I want you to listen to this quote about forgiveness from a theologian whose thoughts were shaped by a father who endured the hell of a communist labor camp. Forgiveness founders because I exclude the enemy from the community of humans even as I exclude myself from the community of sinners. But no one can be in the presence of the God of the crucified Messiah for long without overcoming this double exclusion. without transposing the enemy from the sphere of monstrous inhumanity into the sphere of shared humanity, and herself from the sphere of proud innocence into the sphere of common sinfulness. When one knows that the torturer will not eternally triumph over the victim, one is free to rediscover that person's humanity and imitate God's love for him. And when one knows that God's love is greater than all sin, One is free to see oneself and so rediscover one's own sinfulness. When we take up the posture of forgiveness, we are taking in the Gospel. We are embracing the Gospel. And the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation and to bearing fruit. So yes, I repeat one more time, that means choosing the path of suffering. but it's a path that your loving Jesus understands. Because in order for each of us to be forgiven, in order for each of us to be welcome here, He had to suffer the nails, the spitting, the thorn, the spears, and the wrath of God the Father upon Him. I did say there was glorious encouragement here at the end. Because Jesus says that when you join Him in His suffering, Your Father in Heaven will forgive you. I know it's Mother's Day, but this is the text that we landed on this week. I didn't pick it. This is the first time in Mark that Jesus has told his disciples that God is your Heavenly Father. Disciples are being told that when they take up the posture of the suffering Son of God, They too get the privilege of calling God, Father. I began this sermon asking you how thankful you are that you feel welcome here, that you are no longer an outcast, but more that you can call the Almighty Creator of everything, Father. J.I. Packer once said, you can tell how much a person understands Christianity by how much he makes of the thought of being God's child, of having God as his Father. I'll be the first to admit that appropriating God, the Almighty Creator, as my Father, is one of the hardest things for me in my Christian walk. I like how N.T. Wright describes it, it's a bit like a child dressing up in his grown-up brother's suit and having the cheek to impersonate him for a whole morning, and just about getting away with it, and learning to his surprise, as he does so, what it must be like to be that older brother. Theologians write whole books on union with Christ, but I think that picture really gets at it for me. Being a beloved child is something that seems too good to be true. But when you begin to walk in that, when you begin to believe that, you'll begin to see the power of the Gospel at work in your life. And you'll begin to grasp the amazing love of the God who loves being your Father, who has called you into His house simply because He is love. And as you grow, you'll begin to take on that family trait. As you begin to love others, and especially those who have not yet come, who have not yet been birthed by the Mother, by the Church. So, as children of our Mother, let's heed our big brother, our big brother Jesus, who encourages us to put off the old man and to put on the new and to discover the mystery. So, let us come boldly to our Heavenly Father, taking up the appropriate posture, believing that we can bear much fruit in this life by means of His power, because He can do and wants to do far more than we ever ask or think. So let us pray. Oh, what manner of love is this, Heavenly Father, that we should be called children of God, and such we are. And Heavenly Father, we come to You and ask and pray that as we consider this text, that as we consider what Your Son is saying to us, which seems too good to be true, in a world that seems far too evil, with hearts, our own hearts that seem far too off-center, we ask and pray that by Your Spirit's work, You will help us to take in the Gospel. the very core of our being, to believe this, to believe that despite all the miseries of this life, despite all of our sin, we are accepted in Your sight, that You love us and that we can go out of here loving others, laying down our lives for others, and forgiving others, even as You have forgiven us. Thank You, Heavenly Father, for all You have done for us. and we come to You, praying what we would never pray on our own, but what our Lord Jesus commanded us to pray. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. Amen.