We'll remain standing for the reading of God's Word this morning. Our reading will begin in chapter 8 and continue on in chapter 9 of Mark. That happens to be one of the places where there's one of those inconvenient chapter breaks. We're going to begin our reading at verse 27 of the 8th chapter of Mark. Hear now the Word of the Lord. Now Jesus and His disciples went out of the towns of Caesarea Philippi And on the road he asked the disciples, saying to them, Who do men say that I am? And they answered, John the Baptist. But some say Elijah, and others one of the prophets. And he said to them, But who do you say that I am? And Peter answered and said to him, You are the Christ. And then he strictly warned them that they should tell no one about him. And he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and scribes and be killed and after three days rise again. He spoke this word openly and Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But when he had turned around and looked at his disciples, he rebuked Peter, saying, Get behind me, Satan, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men. And when he had called the people to himself with the disciples also, he said to them, Whosoever desires to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for My sake and the Gospels will save it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul? And what will a man give in exchange for his soul? For whosoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels. And He said to them, "'Assuredly, I say to you, that there are some standing here who will not taste death till they see the kingdom of God present with power.'" Now after six days, Jesus took Peter, James, and John and led them up on a high mountain apart by themselves, and He was transfigured before them. His clothes became shining, exceedingly white like snow, such as no launderer on earth could whiten them. And Elijah appeared to them with Moses, and they were talking with Jesus. Then Peter answered and said to Jesus, Rabbi, it is good for us to be here, and let us make three tabernacles, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah. Because he did not know what to say, for they were greatly afraid. And a cloud came over and overshadowed them, and a voice came out of the cloud saying, This is My beloved Son. Hear Him." And suddenly, when they had looked around, they saw no one anymore, but only Jesus with themselves. Now, as they came down from the mountain, He commanded them that they should tell no one of the things they had seen till the Son of Man had risen from the dead. This is the Word of the Lord. Let's give thanks. Our Heavenly Father, we do thank You for the truth of Your Word. We thank You for the Spirit being with us today to teach us those lessons that we should learn. May we have ears to hear and eyes to see what You would teach us. We ask this in Jesus' name, and all of God's people said, Amen. You may be seated. Well, I must say that my short series on the Gospel according to Mark is going by much too quickly. Next week, we come to Palm Sunday where we will consider the triumphant entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem, coming at His appointed time to be the sacrifice for sin. On Good Friday, we'll consider His suffering and death. And then on Easter morning, we celebrate the power and glory of His resurrection from the dead. I trust that these messages have been helpful. and that we will all come away knowing Jesus better, and come away challenged to continue on in our study of and our meditation on these Gospel accounts. Now, we began by considering the Gospel, where Mark started. Jesus has come to save His people from their sins. We saw the humanity of Jesus in His baptism and circumcision and temptations. We saw His divinity proclaimed as His Father said, This is My beloved Son, after His baptism. We saw how Jesus chose and trained His disciples who would become the apostles and foundation of the church. We saw how Satan and his demons did all they could to oppose Jesus, but they were powerless in His presence. We saw Jesus as the great physician who in His compassion healed many and taught us that we would do even greater things in His name. We considered His use of parables to teach the truths of the kingdom. And last week we saw Jesus as the Lord of creation. Not even a quick summary of any of the gospel accounts would be complete without considering how and why Jesus interacted with the scribes and the Pharisees. And we'll strive to do that this morning, looking at who they were, why they opposed Jesus and even crucified the Lord of glory, And of course, the lessons that we should learn today. Now, you might be wondering why I chose the passage from Mark chapters 8 and 9 as my text, since it had little mention of the scribes and Pharisees, but there is a method to my madness, so just please bear with me. I have often made the point from this pulpit that there is really only going to be one basic question. at the final judgment. What have you done with my beloved Son, Jesus? In our text, what we see is Jesus drawing this great truth out from His disciples with the question of who do people say that I am. And of course, Peter properly proclaims, you are the Christ. As the angel Gabriel proclaimed, Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ, who has come to save His people from their sins. And we must remember that Christ is not the last name that was given to Jesus. It is His title. Just as we would call someone a supervisor, or a governor, or president, And I think maybe some of the confusion is that our standard practice today is to put the title first. But you see, when I say President Obama, I'm not implying, and I hope nobody would think that I was saying his first name was President. In the other Gospel accounts, Jesus makes clear that this truth has been revealed to Peter by the Father. And just as the parables revealed the truth to those with ears to hear, Peter begins to understand. However, I think it's pretty clear that he has a long way to go, because it's not long before his human understanding takes over once more. You see, Jesus then goes on to explain how the Messiah must suffer and die and be raised from the dead. Because He has come to save His people from their sins. And that's what's required. Jesus takes him aside and tries to tell him that this must not be. Jesus needs to be alive and strong. to lead his people to victory. And Jesus then rebukes Peter in front of the disciples by saying, get thee behind me, Satan. So why was Peter rebuked so strongly? Well, the reality is Jesus immediately tells us and him why. And I would submit to you that it's a pretty good definition of satanic activity. Jesus says, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men. You're not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men. We should all Be careful to think about that truth the next time we let those morning devotions slip by because we're just too busy with something else. And just so there could be no doubt about what Jesus meant, He then gathered others around Him and said, whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for my sake and for the Gospels will save it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and he loses his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? You see, As I pondered this this week, I realized that far too often we think about self-denial and taking up our cross as some sort of physical suffering. We must remember the context in which Jesus proclaimed this truth. Denying yourself or losing your life means being mindful of the things of God and not the things of men. It's a question of priorities. Making God's priorities and ways your priority and ways is the real sacrifice. It is a burden. or a yoke, as Jesus calls it. But it's one that Jesus said was easy in His strength. Peter had followed Jesus and was beginning to learn that He was in fact the Messiah. But he still wanted things to progress in the way that he thought was best. From a human perspective, there was no way that he could understand what Jesus was explaining about his suffering and death, and how that was going to lead to victory for the Messiah. So Peter did what we often do, if we're honest. He took Jesus aside to set him straight. So we said at the beginning of this series, saving faith must accept Jesus for who He really was and what He really came to do. Jesus was teaching them the truth that had been revealed in the Old Testament through the prophets and through Moses. Peter was struggling, but he was learning. And Jesus would now go on to give him, I would argue, the most powerful illustrated sermon ever given. Peter, John, and James are taken to a mountain where Jesus is transfigured and seen, I'm sure, in as much of His divine glory as human beings can endure. Jesus appears with Moses and Elijah. The Law. and the prophets. And we know from other Gospel accounts that the three of them talked about the suffering and death of Jesus, just as Jesus had been teaching His disciples. And once again, the Father comes in the cloud to proclaim the truth about Jesus, saying, This is My beloved Son. Hear Him. And then suddenly, They are alone with Jesus. Jesus tells them on the way down to keep these things until after He has risen from the dead. And while we know that Peter did not yet fully understand, still had many trials to get through, and he really struggled when they get to Jerusalem, he does not object at this point or get rebuked again. So there's some progress. He is learning. to know that Jesus is in fact God's beloved Son who has come to save His people from their sins. So what does all of this have to do with the scribes and the Pharisees? That's what I said the sermon was about. Well, I would argue much in every way. Because just as the Gospel accounts show how Peter and the other disciples were learning to know that Jesus is the beloved Son, these religious leaders of Israel are clearly shown to be rejecting that same truth. You see, if you step back and look at the history, by Pentecost, the disciples will be fully empowered by God's Spirit, prepared to go forth and proclaim this truth to all the world. At the same time, the leaders of Israel will have been fully rejected with the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple coming in their generation. Now, this does not mean that every single one of these leaders of Israel were lost. Just as there was an apostate among the disciples and the person of Judas, we see Pharisees like Nicodemus and perhaps Joseph of Arimathea coming to saving faith in the gospel accounts. So, we start with our questions. Who were the scribes and the Pharisees? They were, as I've referenced, the religious leaders of Israel in that day. And they divided into two basic camps. There were lots of nuances, as we have in the church today. But there were two. First you had the Sadducees, which I think if we were naming them today, we would call religious liberals. Because while they claimed to believe the Scriptures and to reverence them, they denied the resurrection and the other miraculous events that the Scriptures clearly taught. You can think of a lot of examples. of this today. We're surrounded by modern liberal churches where if you went in, they would have a beautiful Bible right in the front. They would read Bible passages during the services. And yet, at the same time, through their sermons and their teachings, they would deny who Jesus was and what He came to do. The Pharisees on the other hand, did believe in the resurrection and they believed in the coming of Messiah. Their sin was pride and presumption, adding to the truth of God's Word and wanting God to do things their way, as Peter was first tempted to do. They would be what we would call legalists or hypocrites today. Those who might be very quick to demand that Christians have no contact with alcohol and fight against any change to the definition of marriage, while at the same time never lifting a finger to discipline the rampant fornication and adultery present in many churches today. Mark, as do the other writers of the Gospel account, shows a great deal of interaction between Jesus and these men. Just in the passages that we have read from the first two chapters of Mark, we've seen demons in their synagogues. We saw them challenging Jesus' authority to forgive sins. They rejected the tax collectors and sinners and thought we shouldn't even dine with them. And they had an insistence that their rules be followed regarding what to eat or how to spend the Lord's Day. In chapter 3, we come to their outright rejection of Jesus in a very dramatic confrontation. It says, and Jesus entered the synagogue again. And a man was there who had a withered hand, some sort of deformed hand. So they watched him closely, these religious leaders, whether he would heal on the Sabbath so that they might accuse him. And so Jesus said to the man with the withered hand, step forward. He brought him up in front of everyone. And then he said to them, is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill? But they kept silent. And when he had looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts, He said to the man, stretch out your hand. And he stretched it out and his hand was restored as whole as the other. And then the Pharisees went out immediately and plotted with the Herodians against him how they might destroy him. Why did these leaders remain silent? They didn't want to face the simple truth that his question drew out. Of course, it was lawful to do good on the Sabbath. No one could read the law and not think that. Of course, it is better to heal than to kill. But you see, they cared more about accusing Jesus than they did about God's law or even this man who was suffering in their midst. And thus, our Lord looked at them with anger. Their hardened hearts grieved Jesus and His miracle only hardened them more." Peter, you see, was just as wrong in his theology when he took Jesus aside to correct him, and he was rebuked with words that I don't think any of us would like to hear, even from one of the leaders in the church, no less from Jesus Himself. And yet, Peter responded. And it's with this contrast that we see that Jesus was not angry with Peter. And that Peter did not have a hardened heart. Peter just had a confused heart, as many of us often do as our road to maturity in the faith. As we move on in Mark 3, we come to another warning from Jesus that is caused I've got in my text here some, probably a great deal of confusion down through the ages. Jesus here speaks about the unforgivable sin. But please note, when we see it in the context, it can only apply to those with hardened hearts, like these religious leaders. As we move on in chapter 3, the Pharisees have been put in their place, and now it's time for the intellectuals to try and put Jesus in His place. So in verse 22 we read, And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, He has Beelzebub. And by the ruler of demons, He casts out demons. It's Satan who's giving Him His power. So he called them to himself and said to them in parables, how can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but has an end. No one can enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods unless he first binds the strong man. And then he will plunder his house. Assuredly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they may utter." That's the call of the Gospel. But he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is subject to eternal condemnation because they said he has an unclean spirit. Again, we need to see the picture in history. We're just entering the Passion Week. And with all of the opposition and cruelty that Jesus faced from these religious leaders, though He could see them with anger, though He knew their hardened hearts, though they sent Him to the cross, He could still say to them as they stood at the foot of that cross mocking Him, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. All of their sins against the Son could be forgiven through the very work that the Son was doing right in front of them. However, the sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit cannot be forgiven because it is His work to call us to repentance We saw this in the book of Acts, where the Spirit testified to the apostles that Jesus, whom they crucified, had been made Lord and Christ. The only unforgivable sin is to resist the Spirit's call to repent and believe the gospel. Another way to think about this are the two thieves that were crucified with Jesus, who were both guilty of capital crimes and were being punished. And they were both mocking Jesus as the crucifixion began. In the end, one yielded to the urging of the Spirit to repent and believe, and the other did not. The repentant criminal joined Jesus in paradise that day as a forgiven sinner. And the other chose an eternity to suffer under the penalty of his sins. Those are the choices that lay before us. So what does all of this have to do with us today? Well, obviously, I think the most important lesson is that our desire should be to avoid being scribes and Pharisees. If we hold to the authority of Scripture and love God's Word, we avoid the danger of being those religious liberals. And we'll talk much more about this as we study the book of Beginnings, Genesis. But I truly believe that in modern America, It is the Pharisee ditch that is much harder to avoid. Mark gives us some insight into this with an extended exchange between Jesus and these religious leaders. And if we use our imaginations, we could substitute a lot of the debates that rage in American circles today. In chapter 7, it says, Then the Pharisees and some of the scribes came together to Him, having come from Jerusalem. And now, when they saw some of his disciples eat bread with defiled, that is, with unwashed hands, they found fault. For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands in a special way, holding to the tradition of the elders. And when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash. And there are many other things which they have received and hold, like the washing of cups and pitchers and copper vessels and couches. These leaders and the people that followed them were very good at putting on the outward trappings of religion. and devotion in an attempt to keep the inside clean. In verse 5, it goes on, Then the Pharisees and scribes asked Jesus, Why do Your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashed hands? And He answered and said to them, Well, did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, As it is written, this people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. And in vain, in vain they worship me, teaching as doctrines. the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men, the washing of pitchers and cups, and many other such things. And he said to them, all too well you reject the commandment of God, that you may keep your tradition." He then gives them an example, saying that Moses said, honor your father and mother. Pretty simple. He who curses father and mother, let him be put to death. God takes it pretty seriously. But you say, if a man says to his father or mother, what profit you might have received from me is Corbin. That is a gift from God. Sure, you need some help, but I gave the money to the Pharisees. And then you no longer let them do anything for their father and mother. Making the Word of God of no effect through your tradition. which you have handed down, and many such things you do." Jesus then broadens the audience. He calls others in to make the point that will drive those who do not have hardened hearts to their need for the gospel. At verse 14, He says, when He had called all the multitude to Himself, He said to them, Hear Me! Hear Me! That was the message from the Father. Everyone can understand. There is nothing that enters a man from outside which can defile him. But these things which come out of him, those are the things that defile a man. If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear. And when He had entered the house away from the crowd, His disciples asked Him concerning the parable. So He said to them, Are you thus without understanding also? Do you not perceive that whatever enters a man from outside cannot defile him? Because it does not enter his heart, but his stomach, and is eliminated, thus purifying all foods. And he said, what comes out of a man, that defiles a man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, An evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. Anybody miss that list? I don't think so. But Jesus says, all these evil things come from within and defile a man. You see, the proud Pharisee Saul who became the repentant Apostle Paul, often cited his own life as the supreme example of how it was impossible to please God by keeping all of the outward rules and ordinances in order to purify your heart. He said he considered them all rubbish in exchange for Christ. Martin Luther learned and proclaimed the same lesson in the midst of the Reformation, showing that there was no way to merit the merit of Christ. No human works could attain the righteousness that God demands. I watched one of Schaeffer's films this week, and he makes the great point that, you know, if you think you're going to beat yourself a hundred times to please God, How do you know it doesn't need to be 101 or 102? There is no end to that slavery. Why? Because Jesus said, out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. You see, this is why Jesus had to come to save His people from their sin. This is why it had to be the Son of God who came in the flesh to save man from his sin. This is why it had to be the suffering Messiah. the one who propitiated God's wrath against that list of sins, to come and save His people from their sins. This is truly why we should rejoice to hear the Apostle Paul proclaim in Romans chapter 8, there is now therefore no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. None of us passed that list. And yet, Paul declares there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made us free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh. God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh on account of sin. He condemned sin in the flesh that the righteous requirements of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. May it always be so with us. Let's pray. Our gracious Heavenly Father, we give You thanks for the ears and the eyes that You have seen us to hear and see the great truths of Your Gospel. May we rejoice as we celebrate the remembrance of the great work that you have done. May we rejoice as we think of saints who have gone before, declaring these great truths in very dark lands. And may we be those willing to go forward this week to share these great truths and to live out these great truths in the land that you have placed us. We thank you for this in Jesus' name and all of God's people said,