So far in Mark we've been looking at the beginning of Jesus's ministry.

Today we're going to

continue even further and see how Jesus conflicts with the Pharisees and scribes. Today we're going
to look at how Jesus looks at the heart, how what we do on the outside doesn't matter if we don't
have the heart to want to truly follow, obey, and worship God. We have a whole chapter to get
through we might be moving a bit fast, but the good thing about Mark is that a lot of it is
straightforward. So with that let me pray for us and we'll jump right in.
Please open your Bibles up to Mark 2 and follow along with me as I read verses 1 to 12.

2 And when he returned to tCapernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home. 2 And
many were gathered together, so that there was no more room, not even at the door. And he was
preaching the word to them.3 uAnd they came, bringing to him a paralytic carried by four
men. 4 And when they could not get near him because of the crowd, vthey removed the roof above
him, and when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay. 5 And
when Jesus wsaw their faith, he said to the paralytic, Son, xyour sins are forgiven. 6 Now some of
the scribes were sitting there, questioning in their hearts, 7 Why does this man speak like that? yHe
is blaspheming! zWho can forgive sins but God alone? 8 And immediately Jesus,aperceiving in his
spirit that they thus questioned within themselves, said to them, Why do you question these things
in your hearts? 9 Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, Your sins are forgiven, or to say, Rise,
take up your bed and walk? 10 But that you may know that bthe Son of Man has authority on earth
to forgive sinshe said to the paralytic11 I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go
home. 12 And he rose and immediately picked up his bed and went out before them all, so that
they were all amazed and cglorified God, saying, We never saw anything like this!

Alright so this is a pretty familiar story to most of you I think, and it's a pretty
straightforward one in terms of action, but in it we really get to see quite a lot into what Jesus really
desires in us. And we also have our first characteristic of the heart that God wants in us a heart

that believes that Jesus can save. And since we're talking about the heart today, we're going to be
looking at the hearts of different characters throughout the story.
Let's start with the crowd. We have a small house packed with people, way more people than
should ever be in a house. Then why were all of these people willing to cram into a tiny room just
to hear Jesus? Why were they willing to wait for hours and deal with crowds just to hear a man
teach? I think that we can be fairly sure that most of these people were not here because they
wanted to hear the gospel or for any kind of spiritual reasons. You guys now might say But it's
Jesus speaking! This is God! How could they not want to hear God himself preach?? Think about
it at this point no one really knows that Jesus is God. Jesus hasn't told anyone and has even told
people to keep his powers a secret. The disciples might have an idea but as we'll see later on
throughout Mark and in the other gospels, they don't always quite understand everything that's
going on and certainly not at this point. The people were there out of curiosity. They were there
because this was a man they had heard could heal people and could perform miracles. So for the
most part we have people that hear the Word of God, literally, being preached but for the most part
have no real response.
Mixed in with the crowd we are told in verse 6 that there are scribes sitting there. Now the
scribes were members of the Pharisees, which we've talked about a lot but here's a quick refresher.
The Pharisees were the holiest of the holiest people on the outside they knew the most scripture,
they prayed the most, fasted the most, and even included their own religious rules to try to
completely uphold the Law. The scribes were a smaller group within the Pharisees that were the
guys that actually studied all the texts, that spent hours reading and studying in order to put together
the religious system that the Pharisees followed.
Now let's look at the paralytic and his friends. A paralytic has heard that Jesus heals people
but can't get to where Jesus is at. His four friends, who clearly believe that Jesus can heal and who
also clearly care a lot about their paralyzed friend want to bring him to Jesus to be healed, but have
no way in. So what do they do? They decide to climb up to the roof, dig a hole and basically

vandalize a building, just to interrupt Jesus by lowering their friend through the hole (which was
probably pretty dangerous for their friend too). Just imagine how crazy this scene is. Say right now
during Mustard Seed while I or anyone else was speaking we all started to hear really loud
scratching noises on the roof. We all look up but don't know what's going on. Then the noise
continues and starts to get louder and louder and we all realize that someone is trying to cut their
way through the roof, which by the way is probably a pretty long process. I guarantee that
absolutely none of you would be paying attention to whoever was speaking. And to the guys
lowering their friend, this would be seen as absolutely embarrassing creating such a big
distraction would be seen as not only rude but maybe even a bit selfish. They're basically ruining
some of the time that Jesus could be using to preach.
Here we're not quite sure what's in the hearts of the friends. We know for sure that they have
a sort of medical faith, the kind that most humans have. This is the faith that makes us take
medicine when we're sick, or makes people get casts when they break bones, or makes people get
chemo when they have cancer. We trust what the doctors and scientists tell us, and we have faith
that the treatments they give us will make us feel better. So at the very least, this is the faith that the
friends have they have heard of Jesus healing people, so they believe that Jesus can heal their
friend. And Jesus does acknowledge that they have a certain level of faith it says in verse 5 that
Jesus sees their faith.
But finally, we look at the heart of the paralytic himself because that's the one guy Jesus
singles out and says Son, your sins are forgiven. To a lot of the people there, I'm sure they were
thinking What is Jesus saying? This guy came to be healed and we all know you can do it so why
don't you just give him what he needs?. The Pharisees go why does this man speak like that? HE
is blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone? To them, because they do not recognize
Jesus as God, Jesus is a man claiming to be God which the worst possible thing to them. Jesus
recognizes this and proves he is God first by reading the minds of the Pharisees and calling them
out. But then he starts questioning them and basically saying Hey, you say that only God can

forgive sins? Well you know that only God has the authority to heal people too. So you don't believe
that I can forgive sins? Well let me show you my power. And then he heals the paralytic and
commands him to walk. This is essentially proving to the crowd around that Jesus does back up
what he says, that if he says he can forgive sins, he does it. And we see the hearts of the crowd start
to turn as well in verse 12 they're all amazed and start glorifying God because they've never seen
anything like this before.
But let's go back to the heart of the paralytic. Because Jesus offers the man forgiveness, we
know that the paralytic must have wanted more than physical healing. Because people back then
associated levels of sickness with how sinful a person was, the paralytic was probably told his
whole life that he was that way because he was such a terrible sinner. So maybe it was because of
this that the paralytic is able to more easily recognize that he needs much more than physical
healing- he needs spiritual healing and he believes that Jesus can give it to him. And because Jesus
sees this in him he gives him both. He heals him physically, but more importantly, he tells him
that his sins are forgiven.
Last time Jon talked about how a leper was healed by Jesus but then later proved he didn't
really understand who Jesus was because he goes and disobeys Jesus. The point was that the leper
only wanted the physical healing, nothing more. Here, we see see the heart that Jesus really wants
a heart that believes not only that Jesus can heal physically, but that Jesus and Jesus alone can save
from sin. And this heart stands above all the rest in this story from the crowds, from the Pharisees,
from the friends. This is the heart that Jesus wants.
Alright we're going to look into our next chunk of scripture, so follow along with me from
verses 13 to 17.
13 He went out again beside the sea, and dall the crowd was coming to him, and he was teaching
them. 14 eAnd as he passed by, he saw fLevi the son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax booth, and he
said to him, Follow me. And he rose and followed him.
15 And as he reclined at table in his house, many gtax collectors and sinners were reclining with

Jesus and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. 16 And hthe scribes of1 the
Pharisees, when they saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, said to his
disciples, gWhy does he eat2 with tax collectors and sinners? 17 And when Jesus heard it, he said
to them, Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. iI came not to
call the righteous, jbut sinners.
Our point for this section is a heart that desires to follow Jesus. This story is even simpler than the
last one Jesus literally walks up to Levi the tax collector, who we know as Matthew the disciple,
and tells him to follow him. Levi gets up and follows Jesus. Simple as that.
Now we know that back then tax collectors were considered the scum of society. Not only
did they work for the Romans, which ruled over the Jews and who the Jews hated, but they were
themselves Jews, which meant they were seen as traitors. Furthermore, they could make a lot of
money for themselves by adding extra taxes or tolls to think and pocketing it for themselves, and
the Jews couldn't do anything about it. So if you were Jew back then, you hated tax collectors not
just cause of their reputation, but because you probably yourself lost money due to these robbers
and cheaters.
Which makes it absolutely ridiculous and scandalous that Jesus would come and ask a guy
like this to follow him. Not only are the Pharisees outraged and shocked by it, as we see here in
Mark, but I'm sure all the regular people would have seen it as crazy too. Imagine if there were a
guy that kept taking money from all of you and kept getting away with it, and there was nothing you
could do about it. And then one day we bring in the guy and announce that he's joining CCAC and
that he's going to become a Mustard Seed sponsor. I'm sure all of you would flip! That'd seem
horrible.

That's kind of how shocking it was that Jesus would call a man like Matthew to be his disciple. I
mean, there are even plenty of Proverbs and Psalms that talk about keeping company with the right
kinds of people like it says in Psalm 1:1 How blessed is the man who doesn't walk in the council

of the wicked or stand in the path of sinners...sit in the seat of mockers. To everyone it seems like
Jesus is possibly even disobeying the Bible.
But again we gotta remember, Jesus looks at the heart. Jesus sees in Matthew a heart that is
repentant, that wants forgiveness, that wants to follow Jesus. Jesus doesn't ask Matthew to follow
him he commands him to. And because of God working Matthew's heart, Matthew does the only
thing that we are supposed to do when Jesus commands us he obeys. Jesus goes on to say
thatThose who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. iI came not to call the
righteous, jbut sinners.
It's not the people that think they're all good that Jesus calls to follow him. It's not the people
like the Pharisees that look at themselves and say I do lots of good things, I'm good to go. It's the
people that look at themselves and see a broken sinner in need of grace. It's the people that like the
paralytic, believe that they need Jesus not only for material needs but for salvation and forgiveness.
And the response to that that Jesus wants? A heart that's willing to get up and follow him. Jesus
doesn't look at our qualifications, whether we're good enough for him. In fact, none of us really are
good enough. But that's okay because he wants the people who recognize that they aren't good
enough, that they need Jesus for forgiveness and salvation. It's so simple and something that we
always hear at church, but it doesn't really make any sense when it comes to normal human terms.
This is the heart of the gospel.
Alright turn back to your bibles again, we're going to read from verses 18 to the end of the
chapter.

A Question About Fasting

18 Now kJohn's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. And people came and said to him, lWhy
do John's disciples and mthe disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast? 19 And
Jesus said to them, nCan the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as
they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. 20 oThe days will come when the

bridegroom is taken away from them, and pthen they will fast in that day. 21 No one sews a piece of
unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old,
and a worse tear is made. 22 And no one puts new wine into old qwineskins. If he does, the wine
will burst the skinsand the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh
wineskins.3

Jesus Is Lord of the Sabbath

23 rOne Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and as they made their way, his
disciples sbegan to pluck heads of grain. 24 And the Pharisees were saying to him, Look, twhy are
they doing uwhat is not lawful on the Sabbath? 25 And he said to them, vHave you never
read wwhat David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with
him: 26 how he entered the house of God, in the time of4 xAbiathar the high priest, and ateythe
bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those
who were with him? 27 And he said to them, zThe Sabbath was made for man, anot man for the
Sabbath. 28 So bthe Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.

Our final point is God wants a heart that truly desires to obey. There's a lot of stuff going on
here, but the basic theme in both of these sections is seeing how the Gospel clashes with all the man
made rules the Pharisees have added into their religion. We've already talked about how the scribes
were the Pharisees that studied the Bible and developed their system of religious rituals and rules,
and we've also seen how much the Pharisees cared about outward appearances. Here we have no
different in the first section, we see how they approach fasting. The Pharisees had a systematic
way of fasting they would schedule it for a couple days a week and never broke from their
schedule. Not only would they fast, though, but they would make a big deal out of it, publicly
displaying how they fasted, trying to show others just how holy they were. In fact, the biggest
things the Pharisees would do, which included giving to the poor, praying, and fasting, were all very

public things to make themselves look like good holy religious people. And of course, it was
completely hypocritical they didn't care about pleasing God at all they just wanted to look like
they did.
They did the same thing with the Sabbath honoring the Sabbath is one of the ten
commandments (does anybody remember which one it is? 4th) but the Pharisees went nuts with it.
The Sabbath was like weekly Christmas for these Pharisees that loved tradition and rules and
regulations and above all else, following those rules. And so they imposed tons of these tiny rules
and regulations about what keeping the Sabbath meant, looking down on anyone that didn't keep up
to their standards. Some of these rules were ridiculous for example, you weren't allowed to take a
certain amount of steps on the Sabbath. Say the limit was 2000 steps if you walked a single step
more than 1999 steps, you violated the Sabbath and were sinning. You couldn't carry an object that
weighed more a few ounces. You couldn't do any single thing that constituted work. You could only
use enough ink for two letters. And so on and so forth. And again- they missed the point. God isn't
pleased by outward actions he only looks at the heart.
Now we will look at how Jesus responds. The metaphors he uses are a little strange he
says you don't fast during a wedding while the bridegroom is there you only fast once he's gone.
And here of course, Jesus is the bridegroom. And what he's saying is that the purpose of fasting is
supposed to be a natural response to wanting to talk to God more. People in the OT would usually
fast and mourn at the same time, and their fasting was a way of showing how desperate they were
for God that they would give up even food and basic needs and try to make themselves heard to
God even more. And Jesus is saying I'm God and I'm right here, why are you fasting?. It's like if
you had a close friend that moved far away come back to visit you for a week. You wouldn't spend
that week with him or her moping around and being sad that you don't get to see your friend often.
You would be out with them, enjoying their company! And so Jesus is showing how fake the
Pharisees are they claim to desire God greatly and want to please him through their fasting but
when they have God Himself in front of them they completely miss it. And the other metaphors that

Jesus makes about the wineskins and the cloth is basically saying you can't mix old with new. You
can't mix the old worn out Jewish system of law that the Pharisees took to another level and mix it
with the new gospel of forgiveness that Jesus was bringing. Jesus isn't looking at the outward
appearances when he judges people; he isn't looking for followers that look holy on the outside.
Jesus looks at the heart, and from seeing how harshly he rebukes the Pharisees we can see that he
wants a heart that truly desires to obey God and please God, not one that wants to look like it.
The second response concerning the Sabbath is very similar. The Pharisees ask the question
in verse 24: Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath? And this isn't a question
as much as it is a direct challenge to Jesus and his disciples. They're calling them unlawful,
unbiblical, and unholy. And of course for us, knowing that Jesus is God makes the situation all the
more ridiculous. But let's look at Jesus's response he brings up an Old Testament story that we
don't really have much time to get into, but his point in bringing it up is this on one hand, Jesus is
using Old Testament scripture to prove that human needs come before ritual and long lists of
religious rules. On another hand, he's using the Pharisees own knowledge against them, which
probably made them even more angry than they already were. He's turning their system of rules and
regulations upon its head.
And so we see two very good examples of the heart that Jesus does not want he does not
want a heart that obeys on the outside but on the inside couldn't care less about obeying and
pleasing God. He doesn't want people that can follow long lists of rules but don't care about loving
God and other people. This isn't to say that there are no commands we have to follow; of course
there are many things that we as Christians are and aren't supposed to do that we learn from the
Bible. But the heart behind obeying these commands has to be a heart that loves God and wants to
please Him.
And so throughout tonight we've seen how Jesus clashes with the Pharisees, the guys that
pat themselves on the back for being righteous but get called out by Jesus time and time again. But
it's easy for us to look down on the Pharisees and say that we aren't like them because we don't do

things like public fasting and praying all the time. But maybe some of you have your own system of
righteousness that you have in place whether you know it or not. I know a lot of you have grown up
in church and gone through things like AWANA, and a lot of you know a ton of Bible verses
biblical knowledge. In fact I think a lot of you know more now than I did at your age. But I hope
this knowledge doesn't make you feel like you're a better Christian because of it. I hope you guys
don't look down on other people and think of them as less Christian because they know less or
struggle with different sins than you do. I'm telling you it's very easy as Christians, no matter what
stage of our walks we are in, to naturally want to think of ourselves as better than we are. It's human
nature. We want to look good on the outside. And as we've talked about a lot today what God
wants from us is not our own fake righteousness. He wants hearts that are humble, that realize that
they are sinful, and that truly want to obey and follow God.
On the flip side, some of you may feel like you haven't been to church long enough to call
yourself a Christian. Or you may feel like you have to work up to a certain level of knowledge or
you have to stop sinning a certain amount before you can really feel like a Christian. I hope that you
all know that God has no minimum requirements on how much you know or how holy you act
before he's willing to accept you. Again, it's all in the heart God wants a heart
We didn't really get to hit too many application points today due to time, but today in your
small groups and even beyond I want you guys to be thinking about where your heart is at when
you do things. When you go to church, when you memorize your bible verses (which you all should
be doing), or anything that seems God-related, what are your motivations? And above all, a question
that we as Christians should be asking ourselves every day

The Suffering Servant Looks at the Heart

1. A heart that _________________

2. A heart that _________________

3. A heart that ___________________

The Suffering Servant Looks at the Heart

1. A heart that _________________

2. A heart that _________________

3. A heart that ___________________

The Suffering Servant Looks at the Heart

1. A heart that _________________

2. A heart that _________________

3. A heart that ___________________