We're going to consider verses 15 to 17 of Mark chapter 2 today with the sermon title of The Great Physician's Call and Cure. The Great Physician's Call and Cure. I'll just read those three verses again for us. And it came to pass that as Jesus sat at meat in his house, Many publicans and sinners sat also together with Jesus and his disciples, for there were many, and they followed him. And when the scribes and Pharisees saw him eat with publicans and sinners, they said unto his disciples, how is it that he eateth and drinketh with publicans and sinners? When Jesus heard it, he saith unto them, They that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Well, last Sunday, we considered the effectual call of Levi or Matthew. And these verses, 15 to 17, tell us about what happened next. Verse 17, in particular, is one of the most well-known verses in Scripture. And in these three verses today, I believe we learn about the radical difference between real Christianity and false religion. We learn about the radical difference there is in a newborn Christian. We learn something about what cold religion is like, and we learn something about what the new, the true religion of the heart is that Christ gives us when we become truly born again. And we learn about who the gospel is for, and we learn that the call of Christ is a call to repentance. Perhaps to sum up all those disparate thoughts, we could say that the main theme of our text today is the true nature of real Christianity. Something which is so vital today to come back to and to explain because there is so much false Christianity. Well, we will consider these verses under three simple headings. I don't always do alliteration, but this seemed to work quite obviously. In verse 15, we read of a dinner. In verse 16, we read of a dispute. And in verse 17, we read of a declaration. And so we'll begin with verse 15, where we read of this dinner. And it came to pass that as Jesus sat at meat in his house, many publicans and sinners sat also together with Jesus and his disciples. For there were many, and they followed him. So when the Lord Jesus called Levi from his tax collector's booth, he said to Levi, follow me. And Levi arose and followed him, followed Jesus. And Levi embarked on a new life of obedience to Jesus Christ. And one of the earliest acts in his new Christian life was to hold a great dinner for Jesus and his disciples in his home, in his house, and he invited a large crowd of tax collectors and sinners. Levi must have had a very big house, wasn't short of money, as we mentioned last time, because many people were present at this dinner. In Luke's account of this story in 5.29, it says, Levi made him, that's Jesus, a great feast in his own house. And there was a great company of publicans and of others that sat down with them. It was a large dinner. And so right at the very start of Levi's new Christian life, he wanted to introduce other people to his savior. And he does this by throwing a banquet, a dinner, in Jesus' honor. And so he invites his friends together with Jesus and his disciples. The term disciples, in verse 15, includes the large number of people who were, by this time, following him. It says, also together with Jesus and his disciples, for there were many, and they followed him. So these are not the narrow group of disciples, but the larger crowd of people who were following Jesus at this time. So this really was a great feast, with Jesus as the honored guest, And we can imagine the Lord Jesus and the others reclining on cushions around the low table. And there he was with what the religious people thought were the lowest, the most reprobate people in society. Many disciples of Jesus, of course, there also. But also what the Pharisees and scribes would have considered the scoundrels of that society, tax collectors and sinners. Well, this first act of obedience that we read of here in Levi's new Christian life surely instructs us in the true nature of Christianity. Those who have received grace from Jesus want to share Jesus with others. And where better to start than with your own friends, your own group, and with your own home? It shows that you don't need a lot of experience, you don't need a lot of training to begin witnessing to other people. Training is helpful, of course, but once you become a new Christian, you are to begin sharing your faith straight away. And Levi, no doubt, maybe in a stumbling way, started to tell others about what Christ had done for him. And so, dear friends, we need to be sharing our faith. Whatever, how many years you have, or maybe you're a very recent Christian, I don't know all of you, but you to begin witnessing from day one, like Levi. And we also, I think, see here in the example of the Lord Jesus and in the example of his new disciple, Levi, something about the true meaning of Christian separation. The true meaning of Christian separation. We learn here that separation is not isolation. Christian separation from the world is not isolation from the world, but it is keeping oneself away from the evil and the unscriptural conduct of the world and staying true to the Lord and his word. True Christianity has never been a question of sealing yourself off from the world and hiding from the world, as tempting as that may be. It doesn't mean having no Christian friends or no Christian contacts. In fact, Paul makes this very clear in 1 Corinthians 5, 9-10. where he's talking really about Christians who have fallen into sin. And he says here, I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators, yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters, For then must ye needs go out of the world. And it is not for the Christian to go out of the world. Some have done that, of course. We think of monasteries and that sort of thing. Some of them have been very holy people, but it is not the right way. No, the Bible does not instruct us to isolate ourselves from unbelievers, but to witness to them. Some Christians think that by having nothing to do with anyone outside of their Christian circle, that they are displaying holiness. It is actually opting out of a true Christian life, because the vision of the Lord Jesus for his disciples is for them to be the light of the world. In Matthew 5, verses 14 to 16, Jesus spoke against hiding away from the world. He said there, ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in heaven. Now we have to get this right. It's no good us shining under a bushel. Jesus said you have to shine in such a way that you're shining before men. and that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in heaven. We cannot hide from the world. We must not confuse separation with isolation. So what is biblical separation? Well, Paul, there is, of course, such a thing as biblical separation and it's very important. But Paul describes biblical separation using an agricultural image. He borrows an image from agriculture. In 2 Corinthians 6 verses 14 to 17, and it says there, be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? And what communion hath light with darkness? Be ye not unequally yoked with unbelievers. You see, when oxen are unequally yoked, they cannot perform the tasks set before them. Instead of working together, they're working at odds with one another. Of course, we may not all know that the yoke that Paul refers to here was the wooden bar that joined the two oxen together as they pulled the plough or as they pulled the cart. An unequally yoked team of oxen had either one stronger ox and one weaker ox or one taller ox and one shorter ox. The weaker or the shorter ox would walk more slowly than The other one, making it impossible to walk in a straight line. You see, they weren't equally yoked. They were unequally yoked. And Paul is teaching here that if you unite yourself to an unbeliever in life, you'll end up living life in different directions. You'll be like the oxen who aren't equally yoked. This is particularly important in marriage. There are young people here. It's so important to marry in the Lord because if you marry a non-Christian, you'll be unequally yoked and you'll be going in opposite directions. Decisions, you'll be in conflict over your values, the way you see the world, and you'll never have any peace. And it's true for all kinds of partnerships in life. Do not become unequally yoked with unbelievers to the point where you're dependent on them for decisions or for... They can affect your witness in any way. But I'll repeat, biblical separation is not isolation. It's making sure that you're not yoked to an unbeliever. So I think there, first of all, we learn something about the true nature of biblical separation. Secondly, in verse 16, we read of a dispute. We read of a dispute. And when the scribes and Pharisees saw him eat with publicans and sinners, they said unto his disciples, how is it that he eateth and drinketh? with publicans and sinners." What a contrast in attitude, isn't there, between Levi, this young Christian who wants to share his faith with everyone, and these scribes and Pharisees. We've already come across the scribes, haven't we, in previous sermons, and here they are again. But this is the first mention of the Pharisees here in Mark. The word Pharisee is probably derived from a Hebrew term meaning separatists, a term which was coined for this group because of their obsession with separating from anything that would cause spiritual uncleanness. The Pharisees were, contrary to some opinion, they were generally admired by the people for their piety. They were strict adherents to the law, to the Torah, and also to the oral law, which expanded upon the Old Testament law. And this oral law consisted of traditions designed really to put a fence around the law of Moses. so that no possible infringement could possibly take place. In a way it was a lack of faith because they were trying to make God's Word, they were adding to God's Word with the traditions of men. In fact the Lord Jesus had a lot in common theologically with the Pharisees. in contrast with the Sadducees who were like the liberals really of today. But what Jesus criticized the Pharisees for wasn't so much their theology, it was their hypocrisy. Because they didn't live the life that they were telling other people to live. The way they lived often portrayed the fact that there was a mismatch between the externals of their religion and their hearts, which remained sinful. We read in the Bible how they loved to wear religious garb, and they loved to pray ostentatiously. They loved to take the seats of honor at feasts. They loved everyone to know when they went on a fast And Jesus said to the people in Matthew, the scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat. All therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do. But do not ye after their works, for they say and do not. What a terrible thing it is if anyone would ever say that about us, that our teaching, our theology sound, listen to their teaching, but don't do as they do. What a terrible thing that would be. But that's what the Lord Jesus said about the Pharisees. And we see something of their attitude here, don't we, in verse 16. where we see how the scribes and the pharisees react to the guest list, if you like, of Levi's dinner. How is it that he eateth and drinketh with publicans and sinners? Here is the Lord Jesus among sinners and outcasts. He's the honored guest. He was doing something, of course, that they would never do. The Lord Jesus wasn't there to have a good time or just for the sake of it. He was there because no doubt these friends of Levi had shown some perhaps initial interest in the Lord Jesus or were at least curious in what had happened to their friend Levi. But the Lord Jesus didn't hesitate to sit with those who needed his salvation. But the Pharisees believed that eating with others symbolized religious compatibility. And they didn't believe that it was right for Jesus to be sitting, reclining with such people, because they were not compatible with a rabbi. And so the Pharisees separated themselves from sinners to protect themselves from the contagion of their sin. You know, there again I think we see the difference between true heart Christianity and legalism. True Christianity ministers to the entire spectrum of society. It includes those who are in the fringes, from the fringes of society, those who we may struggle with. The gospel is for people with drug problems, for prostitutes, it's for people with all sorts of things that we find difficult to even imagine doing or even thinking about. But the Lord Jesus just didn't come for church people, he didn't come just for Christian families, he didn't just come for cultural Christians, he came for the whole world. He came for the entire spectrum of society. And legalists simply hide away and despise others. Do you know it's a great test for young churches when conversions begin to take place. And in my experience, churches often fail the test. Because they are challenged by the entrance into the church of people with very different and very difficult backgrounds. And it disturbs the equilibrium. Because we like to be surrounded by people just like us, don't we? People that we're comfortable with. We like people similar to us. And of course evangelical churches always say that they want conversions, but often when it comes to it they can't cope. Because the disruption to the subtle culture is such a shock that people find it such a discomfort they can't manage. And they often balk at the time and the commitment required to look after modern day tax collectors and sinners, because believe me, when you have new conversions of sinners, it takes up an enormous amount of effort and an enormous amount of time. But you know, we have to keep in mind who the gospel is for. Why do we preach the gospel? Do we really mean it? Do we really want everyone from every spectrum of society to be converted and to come here and to be part of our church and other churches? Well, that's what the gospel's for. That's the Great Commission, not just for people like many of us, but for people from all types. That brings me on to the final point. In verse 17, we read of a great declaration. It says there in verse 17, when Jesus heard it, he saith unto them, they that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick, I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Of course, the Pharisees didn't really have the guts, did they, to speak face-to-face with Jesus and they went behind his back and they spoke to his disciples. But Jesus knew their thoughts. And this is just one example of the many times Jesus had to endure the contradiction of sinners. And this leads him to make this declaration. And this declaration not only showed the falseness of the Pharisee's approach to holiness, but also declared his mission to call sinners to repentance. So Jesus firstly says, they that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick. They that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick. Well, that's true, isn't it? Just simply at the factual level. Unless you're a hypochondriac, you don't want to see a doctor unless you're sick. I certainly don't. I'm not very good at seeing a doctor when I am sick. Most people, when they think of what happens in hospitals and so on, are glad that they're well and they don't have to think about that sort of thing. The last thing you want is to have any medical intervention if you don't need it. But once a person becomes sick, and I'm not talking about a cold, I'm talking about really feeling sick, you're glad to be in the hands of a well-trained doctor. You follow their advice and their prescriptions because they know far more than you do. And Jesus said, the healthy do not need a physician, but the sick need a physician. And the Lord Jesus here, of course, he's not talking about hospitals. He's talking about the people's spiritual state. It's an analogy. he's making between physical sickness and sin. The analogy is that a person who is unaware of the disorder in his soul does not desire a saviour. He doesn't feel a need for a saviour and therefore he will ignore the saviour's prescription for his soul. But you know, once a person really becomes aware of his sinful condition, he longs, she longs for a cure, and longs for this heavenly physician, the Lord Jesus Christ. I don't know if you've ever met someone who's under the burden of conviction of sin, who feels the guilt of their sin. They want a heavenly doctor because they know they're sick. They know they're a sinner. They know that they're lost. And there's a great desire to be in the hands of one who can heal them and cure them. Jesus said, I came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance. Jesus rebukes the Pharisees and the scribes. They say that they are concerned for the glory of God and for moral purity. And their approach is to achieve this through some false idea of separation and isolation from so-called unclean people. But Jesus, a perfectly pure and holy God, was willing to visit sin-sick people and heal them. And he would sit where they sat and eat where they ate in order to share the good news of the kingdom of God. But you know, the thing is, to be useful to the sick, the surgeon, the doctor, the physician has to maintain absolute purity, absolute hygiene. Surgeon is about before the surgeon undertakes surgery. We've probably seen it on the TV or elsewhere, how they wash their hands and they're washed right up to their elbows and their clothes are cleaned. and they wear all the right garb, it's absolutely spotless because they have to maintain absolute moral purity because they're going to be delving in to sickness and to sores and to disease and they're going to open up things which are full of germs and they're getting in amongst this person to heal them and to cure them and you know that there will be no good to that patient unless they are absolutely clean themselves. And you know, when we share with our non-Christian friends the gospel, we have to be morally clean. Otherwise, it will be no good to them. But it is purity, you see, not in isolation, but in the act of loving ministry, not avoidance or seclusion. but ministry to those who are on their way to a lost eternity. It's often been said, what is the use of a doctor who's unwilling to mix with the sick? That there are some Christians, some preachers even, you read some literature, you think, well, this doctor doesn't want to mix with the sick, some kind of, academic theorist, but that doesn't help anyone. The doctor has to tend to the sick. And dear friends, if there's anything I want you to take away this morning is we need to be tending those who need the gospel. And as we do so, we must maintain absolute moral purity in Christ. Jesus, the great physician, came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Jesus knew that those who considered themselves righteous would never hear him. They wouldn't listen to him because they would feel no need for him. And the Lord Jesus, we can see, did not spend his labor on those who considered themselves well. He spent his labor on those who considered themselves to be sick. He said, the spirit of the Lord is upon me. because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, and to set at liberty them that are bruised." Not those who've got it all together, who consider themselves righteous, but the broken and the bruised, real sinners. And so in this saying, Jesus negatively says, he did not come to call the righteous. Here, dear friend, is a great warning to us about pride and self-righteousness. These Pharisees thought they were righteous. But the Lord Jesus, in fact, knew that no one is righteous. Romans 3.10, as it is written, there is none righteous, no, not one. There are many, even today, that think they are righteous in their own eyes, but while a person believes that about himself, he will never see the need of Jesus Christ. The truth is, no one is righteous. Everyone is desperately sick from a spiritual point of view. We are all, by nature, sin sick. Isaiah in his first chapter, describing the dreadful condition of the people he had been called to prophesy to, said, the whole head is sick and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot, even unto the head, there is no soundness in it. But wounds and bruises and petrifying sores They have not been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment." Do you know, by nature, we're like that. We're in this dreadful spiritual condition. But pride will make you totally ignorant of your true condition. And there's nothing more dangerous than having a serious condition and not knowing about it. Years ago I began to... I used to try to avoid taking the lift and try to use the stairs and my office was up great long steps of stairs and there came a day where I got to the top and I was struggling and I had to lean against the wall and I went to the doctor and he said I had high blood pressure and I had no idea. The doctor said it's a silent killer because people can go through life and not know they've got it. And it's a dangerous, dangerous condition. Everyone has this dangerous condition called sin in their life and many through pride are totally unaware that they're sick and need the doctor, Jesus Christ. In other cases, there is perhaps in some an awareness that there is a problem, that there is a spiritual need. But human pride prevents that person from going to the Lord Jesus Christ. And they will try to self-medicate, if you like. They will try to make themselves well. And we see this all the time today, don't we? I suppose it's always been the case. We see people turning to meditation techniques, to Eastern religions. They even try strict exercise regimes and clean eating regimes and strict adherence to certain rules for living. And they try to go on this program of self-imprisonment through good works of various kinds. Do you know how dangerous it is for a sinner to presume to know better than the doctor, the great physician, the Lord Jesus Christ? how dangerous it is for your soul to doubt the heavenly physician's power to heal you and to try and do it on your own. Because there's only one person who has the authority, we saw that last time, and there's only one person who has the tender mercy and skill and care to make you well again. And so positively, this saying of the Lord Jesus tells us that he is the great doctor. He's able to make the spiritually sick well. He can make sinners whole. There's an interesting little verse in Jeremiah where in 922, where Jeremiah looks around, a bit like Isaiah did with his people, and he looks around at all the sickness of the people, the dreadful condition the people are in. And he says, is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Has the NHS been closed down or something, in modern speak? Why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered? You see, he was puzzled there. Why are the people going their own way? Why are they not going to the source of healing, to the true source of salvation? And that's a question that we puzzle over, and this is why we go out and preach and share and say, there is only one person who's ever going to be able to save your soul. It's Jesus Christ. Jesus said that he has come into the world for the sick. Paul said in 1 Timothy 1.15, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. He didn't come into the world to make religious people feel more religious. He came for the sick. He came for those who felt their need of him. And in this saying also, Jesus says that he came to call sinners to repentance. Now it's unfortunate in most of the modern translations, I think all of the modern translations, the words to repentance are not included. So typically, as in the ESV, it says, I came not to call the righteous but sinners, and they leave off to repentance. But you'll see in King James, the words to repentance are not in italics, so they're not added by the translators to improve the sentence, but they are part of the text. Jesus came not just to call sinners. He came to call sinners to a specific thing. He called them to repentance. And theologically, of course, this is vital. The call of Jesus to sinners is a call to repentance. We've already seen this in Mark 1 15, in the summary of Christ's preaching. The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent ye and believe the gospel. Well, what is repentance? We spoke about this last time. where I reminded you that faith and repentance are gifts of God as part of the effectual call. But what specifically is repentance? Well, the Westminster Shorter Catechism question 87 gives this definition of repentance which I cannot improve upon. It says there, repentance unto life is a saving grace whereby a sinner, out of a true sense of his sin and apprehension of the mercy of God in Christ, doth with grief and hatred of his sin turn from it unto God with full purpose of and endeavour after new obedience. I can give that to you if you didn't catch that later on. Christian faith is a penitent faith. This is central to the gospel message. Before Jesus ascended back into heaven in the Acts of the Apostles, Jesus declared that his death and resurrection were necessary so that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations beginning in Jerusalem. The apostles embedded this saying of Jesus into the heart of their apostolic message. Peter, on the day of Pentecost, in his sermon in 238 in Acts, said, repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. repent and be baptized. You see that's how you begin the Christian life. You turn away from your sin and you turn to Christ and as part of your act of repentance you are baptized in water. It's not meant to be something you do decades later. It's supposed to be as part of the early part of your Christian life. You're baptized and You come to Christ in repentance and you join the church. And Paul said the evidence that true salvation has come to the Gentiles was that God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life. You see people repenting, you know life has come. You know true Christian life has come. It doesn't come just by people singing lots of choruses and getting emotional and falling over and doing all sorts of extravagant things. It's when repentance happens. It's not very fashionable, I know, but that's true Christianity. The Apostle Paul explained his ministry to the Gentiles to Agrippa in these terms. He said, in response to the heavenly vision on the road to Damascus, he began to preach to the Gentiles that they should repent and turn to God and do works meet for repentance. When Paul was preaching to the intellectual elites of Greece in Athens, He began to preach to the Gentiles that they should repent and turn to God. Sorry, I'm reading the wrong verse there. He said to the intellectual elites, the times of this ignorance God winked at, but now commands all men everywhere to repent. Dear friends, I'm going to close with this call of Jesus once again. It's a call to those who are sick But he calls you to repent. That is part of his cure. He'll give you the repentance and the faith as a gift, but he's not going to do the repenting for you. That's for you to repent, for you to believe. It's for you to be baptized. It's for you to come to Christ. And you have to turn from darkness to light. You have to turn from the power of Satan to God. This isn't a joke. This isn't messing around. We can't do that anymore. In this red-hot atheistic culture, in this paganistic culture, a lukewarm Christianity won't cut it anymore. We have to be red-hot Christians to make any difference. And we have to turn away from all the darkness and turn to the light. And we have to follow Christ like Levi, like Matthew did. And so, dear friends, if you're not a Christian this morning, there's only one saviour of sinners. Come to the great physician. He will heal you, cure you, wash you from your sin. He'll make you whole. You're sick from the top of your head to the soles of your feet, but Jesus loves you from the top of your head to the soles of your feet. He loves you. And Lord Jesus came into this world to die for sinners, sin-sick sinners, and he wants to heal you because he loves you. Pray that you will do so, in Jesus' name, amen. Feel free to contact us at Sovereign Grace Church in Tiverton. Email us at grace2seekers at gmail.com. That's grace2seekers at gmail.com. Alternatively, you can visit our website at www.sovereigngracereformedchurch.co.uk. you