Congregation this morning. I invite us to open our Bible to mark chapter 11 Continuing there. We've come now to verse 20 Mark chapter 11 and verse 20. We'll read through verse 25 Remember that Jesus addressed matters in his office as the prophet first time in regards to the fig tree and Then in respect to his office as the high priest, he came into the temple and cleansed that temple, showing forth the priority of those things which are righteous. We will see next time that he addresses matters in his office as the king, when he addresses the issue of authority. This morning, however, we have this interesting pause and reflection as we come back to the fig tree, and we need to remember the significance of what's going on here, as we'll see in a moment. So Mark chapter 11, and we are at verse 20. In the morning, as they went along, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots. Peter remembered and said to Jesus, Rabbi, look, the fig tree you cursed has withered. Have faith in God. Jesus answered, I tell you the truth. If anyone says to this mountain, go throw yourself into the sea, and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him. Therefore, I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him. so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins. Thus far, dear congregation, the glorious, perfect, and unchangeable word of the living God. You'll want to keep your Bible near you, but let's stop and ask again the help of our God by the spirit in prayer, shall we? Let's pray. Now, Heavenly Father, we come as those by your Spirit's work, willing to hear, desiring to be instructed, but needing, needing the ongoing ministry of God, the Holy Spirit. For a moment ago, Lord, we prayed that you would revive us. And tonight in our sermon, we will consider that in great detail. What does that mean, revive us? And so, Lord, now we ask again for the ministry of the Holy Spirit. as he alone can open our hearts and illumine our minds, making our hands and feet ready and our mouths equipped with the gospel. And so, Lord, this morning, we pray that you would be glorified as you stir up your church. We pray in Jesus' name, amen. So dear congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ, preaching consecutively through books of the Bible, like we are doing in Mark, section by section, helps us to avoid disconnected misapplications. Our text this morning is a very important example of this biblical principle. It would be easy to helicopter into this text And guess, were we to helicopter into this text, guess that the main point is prayer. That would be a mistake. But going carefully and slowly, section by section through Mark, we can see and remember that we are within that context where Jesus is bringing charges and evidence against Israel. It is their day of reckoning. We are in that section then, in that broader area of the Lord Jesus Christ's ministry, where prayer is an evidence of something. Prayer here then in our text is an evidence of living faith, which living faith is what Israel failed to show which is why the fig tree was such an important and beautiful analogy. But what about the church today and all true Christians? As the Lord Jesus Christ asked, as Luke recorded it, when he returns, will he find faith on the earth? What kind of faith? Exampled by praying. You see, living faith, this is in your handout in the bulletin, living faith, what Israel lacked, will be seen in our praying. Living faith, what Israel lacked, will be seen in our praying. So first of all, notice this, Peter properly connects the word to what is seen. We hinted at that last time when we said and made a little bit of the fact that we need the word to define the analogy, as in the sacraments, the word defines the visual. So here it is, and Peter helps us. And so this larger section, I'm gonna give you these verses again, which began in Mark 11, verse 12. And concludes in Mark 13 verse 37, that's the end of chapter 13, this section is the messianic judge, Jesus Christ, bringing down the divine gavel as the flow of evidence demands, declaring Israel's guilt. That may sound like a lot of words, but we need to consider those things when we ourselves are at home, in our quiet place, reading through the Bible, and we come to such passages as we find here, or as you come to the passage in a little bit of what it means to pay taxes to Caesar, or a little bit later, the widow's offering, and how Jesus is in all of these so stern, where he brings charge after charge, he swings the gavel again and again and again. Why all of that? The fig tree really is the key to why all of that. And so within that broader section, Mark 11 verse 12 to 13 verse 37, we find these very narrow texts, like this one. But this one, ours, verses 20 to 25, is difficult in that it is the effect. It is the effect. And it is separated from its cause. The effect has been separated from its cause. Now let me bring you back to that. Go back to chapter 11 and verse 14 to find the cause. Here it is. The word. Then he, Jesus said to the tree, may no one ever eat fruit from you again and his disciples heard him say it. His word. Is the cause? And Peter. Verse 21 makes the connection. Rabbi, or revered teacher, you cursed this tree and now it's withered. The problem sometimes we have is that curse was issued only yesterday in the flow of the chronology here. The curse was spoken on Monday morning, as we noticed, and now it's Tuesday morning. It's only been 24 hours and already the tree is dead, withered from the roots up. It is absolutely cursed and lifeless. This is a powerful miracle. If I were to give you a piece of paper and say to you, here, I want you to number your paper one to five, and I want you to write out the most powerful and impressive miracles that the Lord Jesus Christ did in his earthly ministry, what would be on your list of five miracles? Would it be this one? Would it make your list? Now, I'm not saying we have to put them in some kind of order. One may be more powerful and impressive than the others. You might want to discuss that. We could talk about it. But surely this one. A powerful miracle of His cursing. Though employed to show judgment still, it is a shocking power, isn't it? Note what the disciples, His church, the Israel of God, notice what they witness. Look at the authority of His rapidly working Word. As God cursed Jonah's plant and it died, so Jesus is God, for he can judge to death. So church, this morning, do we see that the very first question of assessment which comes flying off the page, out of the book, which needs an answer from each of us is, do we believe? Do you believe that on Monday morning, verse 14 of the same chapter, Jesus sentenced the fig tree that is faithless Israel to death, and on Tuesday morning, the tree is already withered from its roots? We must answer this question. Each one of us this morning. Can God do this? And then the question that follows then quickly from that is, is Jesus God, you see? These are fundamental issues which must in our own hearts be settled. And why are these questions so immediately important? They are because Israel of old answered the question in Jesus' day with a loud, no. No. He's not God. He can't do this. Israel's issue was a basic lack of faith in and an outright denial of God's ability to do all that he had promised, especially in sending the Messiah, his son. We get ourselves, you see, into trouble when we try to divide and particulate and separate the matters of Israel and the fig tree, and they are the same, beloved. This is his visual presentation to his church and his word of caution then to his church. On the fig tree there was no fruit. they had stopped believing God. So because of this word, we today, the church, we do believe God, right? Because of this word, we do believe God, right? Ponder that. Because secondly, Jesus tells the Israel of God to have faith in God. Now all that we've already been saying in a preliminary way comes to this fine point in verse 22, along with the beginning of verse 23, as we'll see in a moment, comes to this fine point, which is really the summation of the whole, have faith in God. That's the matter at hand. Everything else flows from that. It is the anchor. It is the foundation point. Those verses that we so want to query each other about and and try to maybe even trip up the pastor about that come after it. They are connected to this statement of the Lord. Have faith in God. You see, this beloved church is how to properly understand how to properly understand that the fruitless fig tree was faithless Israel, who had received so much tender love from God. And how many places in the Old Testament Do we see it pictured for us that God was tender to Israel and cared for Israel? I think immediately of Ezekiel chapter 16, where it is told that God lifted her up out of her own blood and cleansed Israel of her own misdeeds, that all then she needed to do was to believe God. to trust her merciful Father in heaven, especially because God was going to send to Israel, His people, the promised Messiah. That's not an ancillary point. That's not a point off onto the edge of things. But it is rather the center of the matter. It is the focal point of His love for Israel. I'm going to send the Messiah to you. And yet here He is. And they reject Him. They turn away. Now, not all. It's why I'm intentionally using the phrase, the Israel of God, as Paul lists that out in Romans. Not all. There's a remnant. But in mass and largely, they do not believe. Israel refused. They are fruitless. What rather they should have done is learned what Abraham discovered, as Paul puts it in Romans 4, verse 3. Abraham believed God and it was credited to him for righteousness. Paul goes on to prove there that Abraham and Sarah were as good as dead. You remember that, right? As good as dead, but what? They believed God. that God could do what he had promised to do. And the result for Abraham and Sarah was children without number. Have faith in God because of who he is, because of what he can do. And oh, beloved, if there is a call to the church today, surely it is this. Look to God and believe. This is the root and a fundamental matter. Faith in who God is, faith in what God can do, which is why we've been saying for months and months now that what the church needs to know is who is God. And knowing God, everything else flows from that. Because in knowing God, we learn to trust all God has said. This then connects us immediately and vitally to where we have been in our evening sermons, if you don't mind me saying so, in regards to, from the canons of Dorp, regeneration, by which we can see, listen, what only God can do, and have faith that he can build his church Because God causes, God gives, God is able, God is powerful. And what the church needs, which as we've been saying very clearly, is a gift from God. What the church needs as this gift from God is faith. But James will teach us. And here we connect immediately to what the Lord Jesus Christ will say in verses 23 and following. As James would say it, the faith that God gives is designed by God to be used. We don't need to say that somehow James and Paul are opposed to one another. That's absurd in the face of it. But what the scripture teaches is that God gives a gift that he designs to be used, not to sit up there on the shelf and admire it and say, oh, look, there is my faith sitting on the shelf. Isn't it pretty? No, but something that God intends for us to use, not waste. And so the church must believe. And we must believe. I'm thinking of us today in this room together. And I want to say that another way. We the church must believe because the church that was our forefathers and mother's church is no longer in the sense of the immediacy of the day. We are the church which must believe God. This is the day when the church needs to believe God again as our forefathers and foremothers did before us. It's no longer the day of yesterday. It's the day of today. Now you may think I'm speaking in confusing ways here, but I hope you understand the significance of that and the need for that. We can't live looking back and say, oh, how things were so much better back in 19 so-and-so. No, this is the day the Lord has given to us to live and to believe Him. Press that another step further. We live in the day where the church is facing trials and challenges which our parents and grandparents and great-grandparents could have never conceived of. I challenge you to think about your grandparents. For some of you, that's thinking back a little ways. and say to them, well, today we have Christians saying it's perfectly acceptable for a man to marry a man and a woman to marry a woman, and it's perfectly normal for people in society to say, I don't like being a man. I'm going to be a woman. I don't like being a woman. I'm going to be a man. And your grandparents would have said, what are you talking about? They didn't have those challenges. But we don't have some of the ones they did. And when they exercised faith in God in the face of those trials, so beloved must the church today. Exercise faith in God based on the situation that is before us, not pining for a different day. We are called to believe. Now all of that leads us, of course, to what we perhaps want to know about. But I don't want to get there yet. I want us to set for one last moment on verse 22. I want you to see this as what Jesus primarily wants his church to know. The disciples then, and the church today, have faith in God. Nothing is more significant than that for us. Israel didn't, and now they look like a dead fig tree withered from the roots up. Do we see? Well, then thirdly, the evidence of such faith is seen in bold praying. Now verses 23 and 24 are the hardest to understand and the easiest to devalue. These verses are very easy to devalue because they are hard to understand. Some of us want to think immediately, well, it's good that we're not health and wealth gospel people, because we would love a passage like this. That's how we're kind of trained to respond to sort of a knee-jerk reaction. Oh, the health and wealth gospel people would love. Just believe in your heart, and whatever you believe will happen. Oh, they misused that. That's the way we normally think through a passage like this. And I'm saying to us, that is a gross devaluing of what Jesus Christ says here. We ought not to do that. Do we believe, for example, do we believe that the prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective? Now, as you're thinking, and you're probably saying, well, yes, I believe, because that's what the scripture says, don't run too quickly past what that verse says, that the prayer of a what? Righteous man is powerful and effective. Verse 22 has, faith in God and pray. What kind of prayer? A prayer that can, 1 Corinthians chapter 13 verse 2, a faith that can, what, move mountains. Do you not realize that Paul was probably thinking of this exact word of the Lord Jesus Christ when in that wonderful extolling of what biblical love is and isn't, he said, well if I have a faith that can move mountains but have not love, a faith that can move mountains? Like the amount of olives that have been thrown into the sea? Yes, exactly that. Surely Paul is referencing Jesus' words here. And surely Jesus is saying we need to have a mountain moving faith. And yet it is this mountain moving is parabolic. It is metaphorical. It is an analogy just as the fig tree was an analogy for Israel. So prayer for mountain moving tossing faith. But what is Jesus point? In using the imagery of mountain tossing, He means for his church to exercise faith in God in this bold prayer that is like moving, tossing mountains. Why? Because such faith says, if God is willing, it will happen. If God is willing, he will do it. If God is willing, as perhaps Ezekiel is talking about in another place, if God is willing to move the Mount of Olives to pick it up and toss it into the sea, it will happen. So to pray, as Jesus here tells us to, is to believe that it will happen. Now with what we just said, we need to carefully bookend this. So say it slowly. to believe that if God wills, it will happen. Here is something, then, that is very important for us. Such a statement and such an activity of prayer requires two things of us. First, to believe all God tells us, and secondly, to equally reject whatever he does not tell us. Do we see that? Do we see the grand necessity that is beneath a command like this? Jesus is elucidating here, verses 23 and 24. If we're going to pray this way, there are two things required. First of all, that we believe all that God tells us, and then secondly, that we reject all that God does not tell us. Do you know what I just defined for us? Have faith in God. It is not laughable that certain ones say, well, if I pray for Volvo, God has to give it to me, here's the passage. It's not laughable to say that. It is offensive to say that. It is blasphemous to say that. Do you want to know why? Because God never said that in his word. He never hints at that in his word. The requirement then is fairly steep. The learning curve is fairly thorough for us. We have to be the students of scripture, you see. We have to be the ones who say, what does God tell me in his word? What should I be praying for? Oh, I need to read the scriptures. I need to grow in godliness. I need to expand my encyclopedic knowledge of the word of God. I want to know from Genesis to Revelation, Old Testament and New, all 66 books. I want to know what God said so that when somebody says something that God didn't say, we should be praying for these things, God didn't say that, I'll know it immediately. No, God never said that. I don't want to waste time praying for the things God never said to be praying for. I want to exercise faith, you see. I want to have faith in God, you see. Let me put it very practically in one way that many of us are familiar with. My own health concerns have been obvious to some of you lately, most of you lately, so I'm saying this in terms of myself as well. Let me ask us this question. Does God say anywhere in the Bible that his plan is that we never get sick, never come down with some major health issue? How do you answer that question? Do you say, no, the Bible doesn't say that? Well, you're right. So therefore, don't waste time praying for impervious, perfect health 24-7 for however number of years the Lord's given that to you. It's just not real. However, does he say that when we are faced with some health concern or trial or serious situation, that we should seek him, ask the elders to come, and that we should together pray about these things? Yes, he does say that, and so what? Pray. You see, What are we doing? We are having faith in God. We're having faith in God. So that we pray boldly about the things God tells us is a part of his will and his plan and his mind and his wisdom and his love. And about all of those things we should pray boldly. And especially then fourthly, the first bold prayers to forgive others. I was of course studying. In preparation for and through the writing of the sermon, as every pastor should do, study. Don't think that you can just sit down and all of a sudden there it will come falling from heaven, the sermon. That's not how it works. But as I was studying, as sometimes happens, I was reading some who were saying, well, verse 25 seems to be disconnected. Verse 25 seems to be something different. Oh, no, it's not. It's actually the most important first bold prayer. It is actually the first call and command for fallen Christian people, fallen people in this world, including Christians who are being sanctified, to struggle with. Another thing, it is the primary thing that Israel missed. That is, knowing God through his word. They didn't know him through his word, and therefore they didn't believe him. Had they known him, the knowledge of the Messiah's presence and of his work would have captivated and enthralled them, you see. Here he is, but the tree is dead. The new Israel of God, his church, the disciples, listening to the Savior apply the power of his work to their hearts and lives, hears them, the Messiah says, and they hear him say, now the first thing you need to do is to forgive others. But beloved, do you understand that if he had not already told them in Mark's accounting three times that He's going to the cross, that there He will be tortured and killed and laid in the tomb and be raising into life on the third day, if He hadn't already instructed them in the ability, what would give them the ability to forgive others, this call would be meaningless. Do you understand that if it is not for the work and worth of the Lord Jesus Christ in our lives, We couldn't forgive anybody else. So what is he doing here? He is saying to them, I'm going to tell you something that is harder than mountain tossing. It is forgiveness. And now, if you've ever lived a few years, if you've ever been with people who have disappointed you or upset you or angered you, or promised things and didn't come through, you already know this. How can we forgive others? By understanding what Jesus Christ has accomplished. By grasping the full weight and worth of his work. and applying that to the harm somebody else has caused to me. Oh beloved, do we see that when we stare at the text before us this morning, when we see the tree withered from the roots up and we see the results of disbelieving Israel, we need to turn our eyes and gaze at the Lord Jesus Christ. who kept his word, who fulfilled the call to carry out the work that each of us will fail at doing and to see that in that, in that is our hope and our ability to forgive others. Now why do we put it this way? Because we're in the midst of a Western world and the church within it that I think does not grasp this well. Forgiveness, I mean. granting grace, being able to say to somebody because of their little offense against me, I forgive you. We like to do that other thing that Paul cautioned in 1 Corinthians 13. It's too easy to keep a record of wrongs, isn't it? For the church today, maybe especially, because we're being wronged. Maybe 10 years from now, the wrong that comes to Christians will be more painful than it is currently in America. But if that's the case, will we have the power and the ability to forgive those who wrong us? What does the text say? Have faith in God, and then forgive. Dare I say it this way, we should be those who go running around looking for somebody to forgive. Because, you see, we want to apply the work that Jesus Christ accomplished by faith. I forgive you. I forgive you. I forgive you. Oh, beloved, why all of that? Because by faith, we can see how much we've been forgiven of. And that there is fruit on the tree of our life. Amen. Well, Heavenly Father, we thank you now that because of Jesus Christ and through Jesus Christ and in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, you hear our prayers. We exercise faith. You hear us, Lord, when in prayer we wrestle with what someone else has done to us and we say to you, oh God, I want to forgive that person. And then we actually walk up to that person and we speak those words, I forgive you. For oh Lord, how much have we been forgiven? We cannot count the cost. Grant us now mercy this day to live by faith and that the fruit would be clear and obvious In our life, in our living, we pray, O Lord, help us. For we ask in Jesus' name. Amen.