Enslaved

Mark 3:1-6 · 2024-03-03 · Jason Wolin · Gospel of Mark | Cross and Crown

Mark 3:1-6 · General. Enslaved — sermon from Cypress Bible Church on BibleSlides.

Enslaved Slideshow for this message PDF Message Download Review Well we are working our way through the gospel of Mark and today we are in chapter 3. The opening few chapters of Mark have focused on Jesus’ authority over demons, sickness and even his authority to forgive sin. And in all three cases the way he demonstrates his authority over these things is through miracles. The Role of Miracles So to understand the book of Mark and to understand our text today, we have to understand the function of miracles. Whether you realize it or not, your faith is absolutely dependent on miracles. So what is a miracle? The term miracle in our modern usage has been so watered down it can mean almost anything. For example, you have a birthday party and you find out you are out of ice cream for root beer floats. So you run to the story and sure enough, there’s a front row parking spot and you get the last 1/2 gallon of vanilla ice cream at HEB and you check out and you find out that it was 50% off and you come home all excited, it was a miracle. We use the word so wrecklessly. That’s not a miracle. Now, let me take it a step further. Elizabeth Elliot tells a story of a woman who was rock climbing. She was hundred of feet in the air. The rope snapped against her eye and her contact lens flew . She was a bit distraught about the whole ordeal prayed to God and an when she reached the bottom, someone asked if they had lost a contact lens. And the reason the person who found it noticed it was because an ant was carrying it on its back. Is that a miracle? No. That’s not a miracle either. Now, nobody is out to deny the fact that God in his providence and care and in direct answer to that prayer devised a way for that to happen. But that’s not a miracle according to the way the Bible defines it. That’s providence. Providence is the non-supernatural way in which God guides, helps and directs his people through the natural confluence of circumstances. We call it providence because there’s no objectively provable way in which the laws of physics have been arrested to make that happen. But let’s take another example. Let’s say you are in downtown Houston. And you are walking in the streets beneath these tall buildings and someone yells, “Lookout!” And you look up and a huge bundle of steel beams has broken loose from a crane and is just feet from your head. There’s nothing to do so you cover your head. Nothing happens. So you look up and that spine crushing block of steel is suspended in midair. And so you walk away and as soon as you get out of the way they continue their descent to earth and blow apart the sidewalk upon which you were just walking. Okay, now we are getting closer. That would be supernatural. Supernatural events are events where the only explanati…

Cypress Bible Church · Full sermon loading below.