Looking Right Past Him

INTRODUCTION Good morning. My name is David Sorn, and I’m the Lead Pastor here at Renovation Church. When I was growing up, my family used to mock me because if we ever saw a deer when we were driving and someone shouted, “Deer!” I would never see it. I would say, “Where?” And they would always say, “It’s RIGHT there.” And I always say, “’There’ is not a helpful word!” But I never saw it. And they’d say, “David, if a deer jumped right in front of our car, you wouldn’t see it” And then one day, one did. When I was in 10th grade, we were driving home from one of my soccer games, and a deer jumped right in front of our fire engine red Dodge Caravan. And my dad just destroyed it, and our mini van. And I still never saw it...just heard it. Similarly, in our spiritual lives, sometimes we can’t see the answer, even though it might be right in front of us. We’re going to see an example of that this morning as we start a new series called “The Concerns of God” We are going to take 7 weeks to study Mark chapter 8 in the Bible, so let’s go ahead and open up to that now. Mark 8:1 13 Page 688 The book of Mark is one of 4 books in the Bible that Christians call them “The Gospels”.. And the Gospels are about the life, teachings, death & resurrection of Jesus. And Mark chapter 8 is a powerful chapter about how we as followers of Jesus should be concerned about the same things God is concerned with The theme for our series and Mark 8 comes out of verse 33 when the Disciple Peter actually has the nerve to rebuke Jesus for saying that He was going to die, and Jesus says: (Mark 8:33) – NIV “You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” So, with that in mind, let’s start out the chapter at verse 1 Mark 8:1 10 Page 688 (Mark 8:1 10) – NIV During those days another large crowd gathered. Since they had nothing to eat, Jesus called his disciples to him and said, 2 “I have compassion for these people; they have already been with me three days and have nothing to eat. 3 If I send them home hungry, they will collapse on the way, because some of them have come a long distance.” 4 His disciples answered, “But where in this remote place can anyone get enough bread to feed them?” 5 “How many loaves do you have?” Jesus asked. “Seven,” they replied. 6 He told the crowd to sit down on the ground. When he had taken the seven loaves and given thanks, he broke them and gave them to his disciples to distribute to the people, and they did so. 7 They had a few small fish as well; he gave thanks for them also and told the disciples to distribute them. 8 The people ate and were satisfied. Afterward the disciples picked up seven basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. 9 About four thousand were present. After he had sent them away, 10 he got into the boat with his disciples and went to the region of Dalmanutha. (Title Slide) Okay, that was the famous feeding of the FOUR thousand. Now, I don’t know if you’ve read much of the Bible before, and if you haven’t, that’s A Okay, we’re glad you’re here learning! But if you have, you may know that Jesus also once did a feeding of the FIVE thousand. And this is not like an accidental duplicate story or anything like that. In fact, the miraculous feeding of the 5,000 takes place just two chapters earlier in Mark chapter SIX. And the stories are similar, but different. Take a look at this chart from the excellent Bible commentator Warren Wiersbe: Feeding of the 5,000 Feeding of the 4,000 Mark 6:32 44 Mostly Jews Mark 8:1 10 Mostly Gentiles With Jesus one day With Jesus three days Took place in Galilee Took place near the Decapolis Five loaves, two fish Seven loaves, a few fish Twelve baskets left over Seven baskets left over Small lunch baskets Large hampers So there are some similarities, but these are quite distinct miracles. And maybe you’re wondering, “Why does all that stuff on the chart even matter?” Well, A) Because every word in the Bible matters. And B) Because the context is incredibly important to the meaning of this passage. (Title slide) Let me explain: This passage really centers around verse 4. Take a look at it again. 4 His disciples answered, “But where in this remote place can anyone get enough bread to feed them?” Now, realize that the disciples of Jesus asked that question (to Jesus’ face!) only months after He had just miraculously fed the 5,000. “But where in this remote place can anyone get enough bread to feed them?” It’s like, “Jesus is right in front of you bro!” But they basically look right past Him. It’s like He’s not even there. I can almost imagine Jesus saying, “Hello! I’m right here.” And so I want give you some reasons why they the disciples this, and why, we, do the same in our lives when we encounter difficulty and problems. Because we all have problems. Some of you are here today and your marriage is on the rocks. Or you just lost your job. Or depression or addiction has been throwing you around like a rag doll Or you just feel dead inside. Or your kids are rebelling If you have some difficulties, the good news is, you’re in a room with everyone else who has difficulties. No pretenders here. And if you are a pretender, that’s your problem! Pride! We all have challenges. The difficulty is, we’re so apt look right past Jesus, like He’s not even with us. Why do we do that? #1: WE FORGET Let me give you 3 reasons WHY WE LOOK RIGHT PAST JESUS AS THE ANSWER #1: We forget what God has done God’s people have been forgetting Him from the beginning. I think back to the 2nd Book of the Bible, the book of Exodus. Moses is leading God’s people out of slavery in Egypt, and God literally splits the Red Sea and they walk through it to safety. And then not all that much later, all of the people are fearful they are going to die of starvation. Now, this is before they have God in the flesh, Jesus, with them. But you can almost imagine Him waving, “Hello! I’m right here! Did you forget the Red Sea thing?!” But they look right past Him like He’s not even there. But then mercifully God rains down manna, a bread like substance from heaven for them to eat. And they are satisfied. But not much after that, they see how tall the people are in the Promised Land, and they go, “Oh this terrible! I’d rather be a slave back in Egypt!” They are a forgetful people. And here the disciples seem to have already forgotten about the Feeding of the 5,000 just months earlier. And look how even more confused the Pharisees are Mark 8:11 13 Page 688 The Pharisees are the religious leaders of Jesus’ day (Mark 8:11 13) NIV 11 The Pharisees came and began to question Jesus. To test him, they asked him for a sign from heaven. 12 He sighed deeply and said, “Why does this generation ask for a sign? Truly I tell you, no sign will be given to it.” 13 Then he left them, got back into the boat and crossed to the other side. WHY WE LOOK RIGHT PAST JESUS AS THE ANSWER #1: We forget what God has done I love this. It literally says, “Jesus sighed deeply” (Make deep sighing noise) He just literally, miraculously, fed 4,000+ people from a seven loaves and a few fish! And the Pharisees are like, “Hey, if you’re really God, show us a sign!” It’s almost like a, “You’ve got to be kidding me” sigh. Everyone is looking right past Him. And are we really any different? What has God done in your life? For most of us, He’s done some pretty amazing things. He died for us. He saved us. And that alone should be enough. But beyond that, for many of us: He has shown up at times in miraculous ways. Provided for us when we thought there was no other way out He has spoken to our hearts and on and on. One of the things I’ve always wanted to do is to make a nice looking list, of all the things that God has done in my life. So that in my hard times, I could pull this list out and say, “See David!! Look right here! God can do this!” But, in perhaps the deepest of ironies, I keep forgetting to even make the list That’s humanity for you. I’d recommend that you make a list, but that feels hypocritical. But we should probably all make a list. Because otherwise, we’ll just keep forgetting. And He’ll do something great for us this April, but by October, when some new difficulty comes upon us, we’ll be looking right past Him again, saying, “Where in this remote place can anyone get enough bread?” #2: OUR MINDS ARE STUCK ON EARTHLY CONCERNS Let’s look at the 2nd reason WHY WE LOOK RIGHT PAST JESUS AS THE ANSWER #1: We forget what God has done #2: We are focused on earthly solutions That’s why the disciples say, “Where around here could we get that much bread?” They’re looking for an earthly solution. Ever since our kids were little, we’ve tried to teach them to pray as often as needs arise. And there have been several times in the last few years where I do something foolish like lose my keys, or I can’t figure out how to fix something” And after I’ve exhausted every possible human solution (I’ve googled it, youtubed it, asked in all my group text chats) I’ll let some angry sigh… And some kid will wander into the room, and inevitably they’ll say, “Dad…did you pray about it?” And then I feel really embarrassed. But isn’t that us? These obstacles come, and we exhaust every possible human solution before we bring it to God And some of you are doing that right now. And I think God knows this about our tendencies because even the setting for the feeding of 4,000 is strategic on Jesus’ part This massive crowd of people is meeting North of Sea of Galilee…in almost the middle of nowhere. There are no eating establishments here…not even fields or gardens. This is a barren land. It’s often what the Bible calls the wilderness, or even the desert. And you need to know my friend, that sometimes Jesus will purposefully lead you out to the desert… …if that’s what it will take for you to finally give up on trying to solve all of your problems with earthly solutions. Because surely if there had been an earthly solution, the disciples would have recommended it. They would have said, “Oh, you know what?! The Capernaum Culver’s is right down the road! Let me get a mobile order started. Let me add some more loaves to my cart” But they can’t think of any solutions. All that’s left is to stop looking past Jesus, and start looking at Jesus. Can you do that this morning? Will you just look at Him for a moment? This passage says that He saw all of the people, and He had COMPASSION on them. He has compassion for you and what you’re facing right now. His heart breaks for you. Will you look to Him? Trust Him? Go to Him? Stop searching everywhere for that earthly solution and search for Christ. And it’s only God’s provision that can satisfy you anyway. The world’s solutions will ultimately prove to be hollow and unsatisfying. But look at this (v.8)… It says the people ate the food Jesus gave them, and they were satisfied. Look to Jesus. And this is why we need to be careful to not take this passage and turn Jesus into a genie. This passage is not about Jesus doing our will, it’s about the fact that in God’s will, He can do the impossible. So we should pray the impossible. Yes, we never know the will of God, but we’re always told to come to Him in faith anyway. As we always say here: We are to pray with such faith that we believe God could do absolutely anything, and yet trust Him with the same level of faith even if He chooses to do nothing. Because what Jesus ultimately wants is you…and your heart. This isn’t just bring your need to God, it’s bring yourself to God. What He ultimately wants is YOU.. WE THINK OUR PROBLEMS ARE TOO BIG Let’s look at the 3rd reason now. WHY WE LOOK RIGHT PAST JESUS AS THE ANSWER #1: We forget what God has done #2: We are focused on earthly solutions #3: We have too little faith This seems like a hard way to put it, and yet Jesus himself, multiple times, says to the disciples, “Oh you of little faith!” Many of us are looking at what we’re facing, and we haven’t brought it to God, because, maybe even subconsciously, we can’t imagine God doing anything about it… …otherwise, surely we would have brought it to Him, right?! It is…a lack of faith. We think, “My marriage is on its last breath…I seriously don’t see how it can be fixed” And yet, here is Jesus (waving)…the waymaker, miracle worker. We look right past Him. We think, “I’ll never feel that passion for you again God, like I did when I was in college…” We think, “This sadness, this loneliness I now feel….” And yet, here is Jesus. And you don’t need to have the most faith ever in the world. For most of us, we just need some faith. To so many of us, he’s looking at us right now, and He’s saying: “How many loaves do you have?” Ah, isn’t that a preposterous, yet beautiful question?! How many loaves do you have? And we want to say: “What do you mean how many loaves do I have? Do you not see that there are thousands of…. You think I have that hidden up my cloak, or what?” “Do you not see the doctor’s report? Have you not seen the state of my finances? Are we not looking at the same thing? “No, we’re not. How many loaves do you have?” And if you were at 0 loaves (which is where most us are), and you weren’t even willing to trust Him with anything, but now… …you can say, “Jesus, it’s not much, but I guess I have 7 loaves” He’s going to say, “All right! 7 is better than 0. I can work with 7. Let’s do this!” I don’t always know why God does this (because He doesn’t need us), but He chooses to work with us… …to corporate with our faith. So increase your faith. Is anything too hard for the Lord? Sometimes in leadership even, I get convicted for having too little faith. It’s easy right now to look out at the culture at large and say, “Wow, things are falling apart fast.” “We better circle the wagons as Christians, hunker down, and ride out the storm” As if God’s saying, “Yeah, things are so bad, America, off, can’t fix that one!” But what is that? That’s a lack of faith. (Title slide) Nothing is too hard for our God. Do you know what God is doing through this church right now? People are coming to faith almost every week. We had over 30 decisions for Christ last week. Over 100 people took Bibles to start reading and investigating on their own. And plenty more are considering the Gospel right now. God is illuminating the darkness in Blaine and beyond, and I believe, in many ways, this is just the tip of the iceberg. But we always lack faith when we don’t look at our Jesus, and we look right past Him… …we look everywhere but at Him. I’m reminded of a faith update I heard a few months ago at the house group my wife and I attend A woman in our group was sharing how she has an anxious dog that tends to just bark at everything (kids, dogs walking, the poor amazon driver, you name it). Whenever the dog gets nervous about something, it starts running around and barking and going crazy. But she says to her dog, “Hey, Eyes on Me! Eyes on me!” And when the dog looks at her, it can stay calm…because it knows that everything is going to be okay. And for many of you, this is the most important thing you need to hear from God’s Word today: Stop looking right past Him. And put your eyes right on the author and perfector of your faith. And come to Him. THE GOSPEL And for others of you, what you need to know that you cannot ever truly be satisfied in life until you fully put your life in Jesus’ hands. I think of when Jesus fed the 5,000, he said this to His listeners: (John 6:35) – NIV 35 Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.  There is a deeper satisfaction, a deeper life available to you. But it’s not where the world says it is. It’s not in getting a better home. Or another promotion. Or an Instagram perfect life. NO, it’s in turning your life over to Jesus and receiving his gift of grace. He died on the cross for your sins. You were deserving of God’s judgment for your sins. And yet in God’s love for you, He sent Jesus to take the punishment for you. And its’ when you believe that He died for you, and you receive Him into your life as your Savior…. …And you invite Him in to be the Leader of your life… That you can truly be saved, forgiven, have a relationship with God, and have eternal life in heaven, not in hell. And if you’ve never done that before, I urge you to give your life to Him now. In fact, let’s just have everyone, just for a minute, close your eyes and bow your head. If you need to make this decision for the first time today…to tell Jesus that you need His forgiveness for your sins…to make Him the Lord of your life…to accept His gift of Eternal life… In just a minute, I’m going to ask you to raise your hand. No one’s going to be looking at you at all, that’s why we had everyone close their eyes. But sometimes in life, we just need that moment…that line in the sand moment. To say, “God I’m taking that leap of faith to you today” If you need to tell God for the first time today that you do believe, and you want to follow Him and be forgiven, raise your hand. The Bible tells us that in this moment we believe in our hearts and confess with our mouths. Repeat after me Dear God I confess to you, that I have sinned against you. But God I believe, that you sent your Son Jesus, to take my place And God I thank you, for forgiving my sins. And now I commit, to following you, with my life.