Christ Church Washington D.C.

The sermon text for today is from the Gospel of Mark chapter 6. And I will read that chapter. It is 56 verses. So hear now the word of the Lord.
And are not his sisters here with us? And they took offense at him. And Jesus said to them,
And he went about among the villages teaching. And he called the twelve and began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. He charged them to take nothing for their journey except a staff, no bread, no bag, no money in their belts, but to wear sandals and not put on two tunics. And he said to them,
King Herod heard of it, for Jesus’ name had become known. Some said John the Baptist has been raised from the dead. That is why these miraculous powers are at work in him. But others said he is Elijah. Others said he is Elijah.
He is a prophet like one of the prophets of old. But when Herod heard of it, he said, John, whom I beheaded, has been raised. For it was Herod who had sent and seized John and bound him in prison for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife, because he had married her. For John had been saying to Herod, it is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife. And Herodias had a grudge against him and wanted to put him to death, but she could not. For Herod feared John,
knowing that he was a righteous and holy man, and he kept him safe. When he heard him, he was greatly perplexed, and yet he heard him gladly. But an opportunity came when Herod, on his birthday, gave a banquet for his nobles and military commanders and the leading men of Galilee. For when Herodias’ daughter came in and danced, she pleased Herod and his guest. And the king said to the girl, ask me for whatever you wish, and I will give it to you.
And she said to her mother, for what should I ask? And she said, the head of John the Baptist. And she came in immediately with haste to the king and asked, saying, I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter. And the king was exceedingly sorry, but because of his oaths and his guest, he did not want to break his word to her. And immediately the king sent and executed.
And he went and beheaded him in the prison and brought his head on a platter and gave it to the girl. And the girl gave it to her mother. When his disciples heard of it, they came and took his body and laid it in a tomb. The apostles returned to Jesus and told him all that they had done and taught. And he said to them, come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while. For many were coming and going and they had no leisure even to eat.
And they ran there on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them. When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd. And he had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd. And he began to teach them many things. And when it grew late, his disciples came to him and said, this is a desolate place and the hour is now late. Send them away to go into the surrounding countryside and villages.
And buy themselves something to eat. But he answered them, you give them something to eat. And they said to him, shall we go and buy 200 denarii worth of bread and give it to them to eat? And he said to them, how many loaves do you have? Go and see. And when they had found out, they said, five and two fish. Then he commanded them all to sit down in groups on the green grass. So they sat down in groups by hundreds and by fifties. And taking the five loaves and the two fish,
he looked up to heaven and said a blessing and broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples to set before the people. And he divided the two fish among them all. And they all ate and were satisfied. And they took up twelve baskets full of broken pieces and the fish. And those who ate the loaves were five thousand men. Immediately he made his disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, to Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd.
And he went up on the mountain to pray. And when evening came, the boat was out on the sea, and he was alone on the land. And he saw that they were making headway painfully, for the wind was against them. About the fourth watch of the night, he came to them walking on the sea. He meant to pass by them, but when they saw him walking on the sea, they thought it was a ghost and cried out. For they all saw him and were terrified. But immediately he spoke to them and said, Take heart, it is I, do not be afraid.
And he got into the boat with them, and the wind ceased. And they were utterly astounded, for they did not understand about the loaves, but their hearts were hardened. When they had crossed over, they came to the land at Gennesaret and moored to the shore. And when they got out of the boat, the people immediately recognized him and ran about the whole region and began to bring the sick people on their beds to wherever they heard he was. And wherever he came, in villages, cities, or countryside, they laid the sick in the marketplace,
and implored him that they might touch even the fringe of his garment, and as many as touched it were made well. The word of the Lord. Amen. Let us pray. Our Father, by your Holy Spirit, give us understanding of these verses that we might know you better. Help us to walk in obedience to your ways and to do so out of love for you. Make us more like Jesus, in whose name we pray. Amen.
So that was Mark chapter 6, 56 verses. And I do hope you brought some loaves and fish, because this might take a while. I’m just joking. I’m just joking. You and I are privileged to follow Jesus Christ.
And we must not take this privilege for granted. Being a Christian is not simply about having that title given to us. It is about being in union with Jesus Christ and becoming more and more like Him, with the result that not only we as individuals are transformed, and not only that we as a church body are transformed, but that this transformation extends out into the world around us.
In many ways, our culture is divided, and many of these divisions are extreme. They are really polar opposites. And because of this, the tendency of human nature, including our own, is to become angry and hateful. And while there are many things that should make us angry as Christians, what we do not want to do is engage with the world like the world.
We are living outside of Jesus Christ, apart from Jesus Christ. We have to remember that their weapons are not our weapons. Jesus Christ said that He will build His church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. For over 2,000 years, this has been proven true. And this will be the case into the future, and this is the case right now in the present.
Therefore, it is imperative that we look to Him by faith, obey Him, and trust that the way the world is transformed is through the church. And this transformation is most of the time slow. But in that slowness, we must not become sidetracked into thinking that Jesus’ plan isn’t working, and so we need to come up with something else. Even in the current climate,
where evil seems so visible, so in our faces, we must not let this distract us or make us feel like we are backed into a corner and therefore desperate. We must not also allow this to make us become discouraged. Instead, even when things don’t seem to be going well, or all we can see before us are the many obstacles, or we are not making very much headway,
we must not lose heart. Because when we lose heart, we lose the ability to see the awesomeness of our God, thinking instead that either He must not care, or that He is unable to help, or that He is too weak to bring about real gospel transformation in this world. Here in Mark chapter 6, I know this has been various pastors coming through, preachers coming through.
We’re in chapter 6, and in this chapter, we continue to learn what it looks like to follow Jesus. And we are encouraged to see Him as He truly is, which is an important part, a very important part, of following Jesus Christ faithfully. So, in chapter 6, after ministering throughout the region of Galilee, Jesus then returned to the town He grew up in, which was the town of Nazareth,
500 or so people in it. So, very small town, a town where everyone knew everyone. And this visit that He takes to Nazareth is not a family visit. He’s not going to see His family, per se. Instead, this is a trip in which His disciples follow Him. He’s taking them there to teach them something. And what they learned, one of the things, is that unbelief can come from some of the most unexpected places. And it has very powerful
effects in a bad way. In this situation here in Nazareth, their unbelief was so great, in fact, that we’re told Jesus marveled over it. So this must have been very noticeable. Yet, even though their unbelief was so great and He marveled over it, He was still willing to heal a few sick people, showing forth, even in the midst of all of that, He’s still gracious,
He’s still powerful, and then we’re told He left and went to other villages. Unbelief, even widespread unbelief, is detrimental to those with the unbelief. But you and I as Christians must remain confident knowing that Jesus is still greater. And Jesus continues His work. He continues His ministry. He continues His mission. There is absolutely nothing that can ultimately stop Him.
This is something else the disciples learned there in Nazareth that day. Jesus then does something that up until this point He had not done before. He calls His disciples to Himself and then He sends them out two by two. And He gave them authority over the unclean spirits. He sends them out on mission for the very first time.
He doesn’t take anything with them on their journey. No bread, no bag, no money. Don’t even take your normal two tunics you would have taken. Just take your sandals, take your walking stick. By telling them that, He’s reminding them right up front, the first mission, that they were to depend completely and solely upon God. This would be true for all the missions they went on. Both to provide their physical needs as well as to perform the task that He was sending them out to perform.
They were being sent out under the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ, and it would be only under His authority that the mission would be accomplished. He was using them, these men, to carry out His mission, which was a huge honor, as well as something they needed to carry out exactly as He commanded, leaving all the results up to Him. And so, we’re told, they headed out, they have their sandals, they have their one tunic,
they go forth under the command and authority of Jesus Christ, they proclaim repentance, they cast out many demons, they anoint sick people with oil, and they heal them. Again, under the authority of Jesus Christ, according to His plan. So, in between the rest of that story, which is just a little follow-up when they return to tell Jesus all that had happened, we have these pretty lengthy verses here about,
John the Baptist. As the disciples are out on this first mission, Jesus’ name is becoming known more and more, we’re told. And so, He’s becoming more and more well-known. Now, for Herod, there was some confusion, and there was also some great fear. Because whenever he heard about Jesus, and he heard all that Jesus was doing through these men, what he began to think was, and there were others thinking the same thing,
this must be John the Baptist raised from the dead, and he’s come back and he’s using these men and he’s working these miracles through these disciples. Now the story is then recounted of how John the Baptist had his head cut off. Now this Herod here is Herod Antipas. This is the son of Herod the Great. Herod the Great being the king who was there ruling whenever Jesus Christ was born. So this is now his son.
Herod, who was the unlawful wife, did not like this at all. And so she wanted Herod to put John the Baptist to death. But Herod feared John the Baptist because he was such a righteous and holy man. And he kept him safe.
Now we don’t want to miss this. Herod, a man with great power, was afraid of John the Baptist who had no human authority, no human position or title or anything like that. And why was Herod, this powerful man, afraid of John the Baptist? It’s because we’re told he knew that John was a righteous and holy man. Let us take note of this.
And this may be especially fitting for this city that is full of powerful and influential people. This may, to our modern ear in this culture, sound strange or even unlikely, but whenever you live a righteous and a holy life, other people will fear you. Just your presence in a room will have a powerful effect simply by living a righteous and holy life. For even then,
even though they might not understand it, the power and the presence of God will be evident in your life. Darkness cannot stand in the presence of light. And so don’t miss the fact that just by living a righteous and holy life, you as individuals, you as families, you as a church, have a powerful effect in your community and your culture around you. But to be clear,
living a righteous and holy life also led to John’s death. During a party full of powerful people, Herodias took the opportunity. Her daughter was dancing in front of the guests and this pleased the king. And what we read is that John’s head ended up on a platter. So even a man, John the Baptist, a man with such gravitas, really, I mean, this was a wild man.
He’s eating locusts and wild honey. He’s just a rugged guy. This guy with gravitas who was so faithful and who simply lived a righteous and holy life day in and day out didn’t get to retire. He didn’t get to live a comfortable life for his faithful service as the forerunner to Jesus Christ. That didn’t happen. Instead, his short life,
ended in jail, and then his head was cut off, and it was served on a platter at a feast. I mean, humanly speaking, that is very humbling to think about your head, your own head, being sort of passed around at the feast on a platter for everyone to laugh at and mock. So before giving the rest of the story with the disciples who were sent out on their first mission for Jesus, Mark includes this story.
There is a cost to following Jesus. Scripture is very open and clear about that. It can, in fact, be dangerous to follow Jesus Christ. The growth and the spreading of the kingdom do not come without suffering. As Jesus’ name is made known,
such that His power and authority are made manifest, this will bring about some difficulties for those who follow Jesus Christ. Now, with this in our minds, the disciples now return from their first mission and they report to Jesus everything that had happened on that mission. Now, it’s important for us to keep in mind that while their first mission went well, this was not their only mission for the God they followed.
The disciples would continue to labor for years and as we read scripture and then if you read even tradition outside of that, things were very difficult. This was a very difficult time for the church. I mean, really the first 300 years or so was very difficult for these Christians. And other than John, the Apostle John, we’re told through tradition that all of the other apostles ended up as martyrs.
And yet, they are the foundation of the church. We’re told in Ephesians that the church is built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets. Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone. So though they had many missions and many struggles, and though most of these men, apostles, died as martyrs, they were successful because they followed Jesus and they did things the way that he taught them to do them.
So one thing we have to remember is we have to be faithful to our master, no matter what’s going on around us. Another thing we need to keep in mind here as we think about the lives of the apostles,
is that we have to think long term rather than short term. We have to make sure that we stay faithful and keep on track even when we meet setbacks, even when we come across struggles. We are playing the long game and we need to keep putting one foot in front of the other even when things get difficult.
We’re told they wanted to take them away to get some rest. They had been busy. They needed some rest. But there were so many people coming and going who noticed them that they get out on a boat and they go across the Sea of Galilee to a desolate place where they can rest. But all these people who notice them, they see kind of where they’re heading and they begin to run around the edge of the Sea of Galilee on foot. And in fact, they get there ahead of the disciples who are in this boat.
Now, once they get there on shore and here’s these people again that they’ve been ministering with and they’re tired and they need rest, instead of getting angry because their plan had been messed up to rest, we’re told that Jesus had compassion. And he went ashore and he began teaching them and he saw them, we’re told, as people who were sheep, like sheep without a shepherd.
And he didn’t want the people to be like sheep without a shepherd. And so he had been laboring among them for many years and now he’s passing the baton on and he wants these people to be cared for. He wants these people to have a shepherd. And the Lord tells Moses that Joshua would be that man.
Now as you probably know, Joshua in Hebrew is the same name as Jesus in the Greek. And so pointing forward many years later, here we are and we see that the people are in the wilderness once again and Jesus is the shepherd who gives them rest, who leads them, and who cares for them. And dear saints, just as a reminder for you, the Lord Jesus Christ is your good shepherd as well.
He leads you. He cares for you. He gives you rest as you follow him. Now, it was getting late. The disciples were concerned that all these people out in this desolate place would not have anything to eat. So they tell Jesus, look, we’ve got to send these people away. They need to get out of here so they can go find some food. And Jesus looks at them and says, you get them something to eat. Now, I don’t know what exactly they were thinking, but they’re probably thinking, what are we going to do? We don’t have the food.
There’s nowhere to buy it, even if we had money to buy it. We’re told that there were 5,000 men. This does not include, apparently, women and children. So this is a huge group of people. There was no way they were able to do this. And so Jesus says, okay, go find out how many loaves of bread there are here. And they come back and they say, Jesus, we found five loaves of bread and we also found these two fish. So really not much here.
Jesus then commands the crowds to sit down in groups, so they sit in fifties and hundreds. And when you’re thinking of this, many passages might come to our mind. Psalm 23 is one of the ones that comes to our mind. He tells them to go. They’re sitting in the green grass, we’re told here. And Jesus took this little bit of food. He overlooks these thousands of people. He looks up to heaven. He says a blessing. He took the food. He broke it.
He gave it to the disciples and told them to go set this food before the people. And the result is every single one of those people ate and every single one of those people were satisfied. So much so that there were leftovers. Much like God provided bread from heaven when the Israelites wandered in the wilderness, so Jesus, the good shepherd, provides miraculous bread for these sheep to eat.
We don’t have enough money. We don’t have the right position. We don’t have the right influence.
We don’t have the time. We have so much going on. We’re busy. We don’t have the energy. We don’t have the strength. Or maybe you look at your life and you think, I have failed so many times before. I mean, what am I going to do? And the reasons and the excuses can keep coming. But something we learn in this story is that while serving God, there are times purposefully that God will remind us of our weaknesses and our limitations.
And that is good if our response is to obey Him anyways. Relying upon Him to work through us to accomplish what He wills to accomplish. It is good for us to know our weaknesses. But it is not good to get stuck focused on our weaknesses. You and I serve a God who is an expert at using weak people to get things done.
Something else interesting about this story, feeding this multitude here, is that when Jesus involved his disciples in this work, they were having to go back to Jesus again and again and again during this feeding of the multitude. The way this is written. So the New American Standard says it this way, which makes this kind of clear. It says,
Instead of producing all this food at one time, he did it little by little, by design, so that his disciples would need to keep coming back to him every time. They’re having to come back to him. It is good for us.
When in our weaknesses and limits, Jesus does not simply do everything all at once, but he does it slowly over time and little by little, so that you and I have to keep going back to him, remaining dependent upon him, learning to rest in him as we keep working. Now you and I, and God thankfully gave us a pattern of rest every week, right?
But you and I, we like to rest whenever the work is done, right? You mow your yard or something and then you go inside and you rest or you do some chore and you go inside and rest. But as Christians, we have to learn to rest in him while the work is ongoing. Because until we die, the work is there. We have to learn that we can either wear out, right? We crash and burn because we’re doing it in our own strength.
Being refreshed in Christ, we’re not going back to Christ again and again and again like we’re supposed to. But we’re trying to do it in our own strength and we burn out. Or we can learn to rest in him along the way. Learning that he makes us strong in our weaknesses. Again, God designed it to work this way. So take advantage of that and keep going back to Christ again and again. Now in the next verses, Jesus immediately made his disciples get into a boat.
He tells them to go to the other side of the sea while he gets alone and goes up on the mountain to pray. Well, about the fourth watch of the night, which is roughly somewhere in the neighborhood of 3 a.m., they’ve been out there a while rowing in this boat. The wind is against them. They’re not making much progress. And so Jesus sees them out there and he begins to walk toward them, walking on the water.
But whenever they saw him, they were terrified and they think, this is a ghost. Which, when you’re reading this, kind of sounds strange. Like, why wouldn’t they just know this is Jesus? Well, we’re told here that their hearts were hardened. But Jesus says to them, take heart, it is I, do not be afraid. He gets in the boat with them. Immediately the wind stops, which is another miracle. And they were utterly astounded.
Because they did not understand about the loaves. Again, their hearts were hardened. They did not understand that just as only God could miraculously feed all of these people with so little, so only God could walk on water. An interesting part of this story is when Jesus meant to pass by them. Does this mean that he was going to keep walking and just kind of wave at them and leave them behind?
Well, the answer is no. There’s something else going on here. In Exodus chapter 33, right after the golden calf incident, Moses asked to see God’s glory. You remember that passage where he’s pleading with God, let me see your glory. But God tells him, you can’t see my glory. You can’t see my face. And so he tells Moses, what I’m going to do is I’m going to pass by, but when I do, I’m going to hide you in a cleft of this rock so that you won’t be able to see my face.
And so the Lord is passing by him in this way. But then in John 1.14, we read this, And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. With these passages in mind, in this story, the reason that Jesus meant to pass by His discipleship
was not to hide His glory from them, but so that His glory might actually be seen by them, so that they might see that He is God in human flesh. And instead, they’re terrified, and they didn’t get it. But again, Jesus, the good shepherd that He is, is very kind and patient with them and with us. He says to them, take heart, it is I, do not be afraid.
When He says it is I, He is not simply saying, hey guys, it’s me. But rather He’s saying, I am. He is saying that He is the Lord God. But their hearts were hardened and they didn’t really understand this at that time. Now as we’re coming to a close here, we need to understand that we are no different than these disciples in many ways. Sometimes we struggle with this as well.
So ask yourself a few questions. Do you see Jesus for who He truly is? Or is your heart hardened in some way? Is there something you’re missing about Him because your heart has become hardened? For whatever reason and in whatever way. As you follow Jesus, is your heart full of fear and frustration? Right? Fear of man, fear of everything going on. And you’re just frustrated and angry and even bitter. I heard earlier,
some repentance and reminder not to be bitter. Or are you in constant awe of your God? As you follow Jesus, are you distracted by the endless difficulties to the point of discouragement and anxiety? Or do you find that even during the ongoing work and all of the struggles that your soul is still able to find rest in Him?
Do you only see the trials and the things piling up in front of you, the big decisions at work, the endless tasks in the home, children who need constant care, the large amount of work within the church itself? Do you become so focused on all of that, with all of this piling up, or in the midst of all that, are you able to see Jesus Christ as He truly is?
Be honest before God. Maybe you think, or you pretend, or you do have a tough exterior. Maybe you are the guy, or the lady, or the child who thinks that you have it all together on your own, but in reality you are near crashing because you have not yet learned to rest in Christ, or you are struggling to see Him as He is.
Confess and repent where necessary. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you. He is given to us as our helper.
Be encouraged and take heart. Be of good cheer. Christ is building His church. The gates of hell cannot prevail against it. You are part of His church. And even in all of your weaknesses, all of your failures, all of your fears, He continues to use you and work through you in the particular role that He has given you, which is a part of His great mission, a mission that will not fail. Let us pray.
Our Father, Your Word has gone forth by the power of Your Holy Spirit. We ask now that it may perform in us the work that You have intended. Thank You for ministering to us in this way today, in each Lord’s Day.