October 1 sermon Are you with me or against me Mark 9: 38-50

October 1 sermon Mark 9: 38-50

A man stopped by a barber shop for a shave. The barber was a lay Baptist preacher. When the man asked for a shave the barber told him, "My wife Grace will shave you."The man had to admit it was the finest, closest shave he had ever had. "How much", he asked."Fifty dollars" was the reply. The man thought that was a bit steep but paid anyway. A month later he realized that his beard was no longer growing. His face was just as it was when he was shaved.He went to barber and told him what was happening. "Oh", said the barber, "That is the way it is supposed to be. You have been shaved by Grace, once shaved, always shaved."

“Teacher”, says John, “we saw a man driving out demons in your name and we told him to stop, because he was not following us.” Well, what’s wrong with that? He’s not a follower of Jesus so he should not be casting out demons, right. Well let’s go back a few verses.

Just before this, they were walking to Capernaum. On the road, the disciples were bickering with each other about who was greatest among them. “I’m better than you because I was on the mountain with Jesus. I’m better because I was called first.” It’s kind of like sisters bickering back and forth every day.
So we go into this with John saying “this man was casting out demons ‘in your name’ but WE told him to stop. WE showed him. He’s not in the cliché with us 12. He’s not following US.” Did you catch that? John said “He’s not following US” not “He’s not following YOU.” The disciples had control issues.

It’s just one chapter later that James and John go to Jesus and ask to sit on either side of him in the Kingdom of God. The disciples want the power. The disciples want the glory. Anyone who was not like them, was not doing it right.
Do you remember when you were a kid playing a game such as football or basketball. You didn’t care about being team captain, but you wanted to be picked first. You wanted to stand up, chest out and say IN A DEEP VOICE “look at me. I was picked first.” You wanted to be on the winning team and you definitely did not want to be picked last.

Who is getting picked last in our neighborhood or church right now? Who doesn’t have control, but doesn’t want control? Who are we (as a church) missing that could use a hand more than a prayer? Think about that as we go thru this scripture.
Jesus tells John and the others “Do not hinder him. If he is doing a miracle in my name, he is only doing good.” Earlier in this chapter at verse 29, the disciples could not bring a demon out of boy.
They were probably a little miffed about that, and when they see this other guy who is not ‘one of the insiders’ doing exactly what THEY should be doing, jealousy flares up. Do you remember our OT scripture?

Two men who had not been with the group of 70 but were listed were filled with God’s Spirit and started prophesying. Joshua came running up and wanted Moses to stop them immediately. But Moses quipped back, “are you jealous? This is a great thing. In fact I wish everyone in the camp were prophets like this.”

Jesus said “do not hinder him.” The word hinder in the Greek is ‘koluo’. It was a way of tying the front legs of an animal together at night to keep them from running away. There is actually a more graphic description of the word used in a popular movie a few years ago.

Does anyone remember the 1990 movie with James Caan and Kathy Bates called Misery? Caan was a writer and Kathy Bates was an obsessed fan who pulled him from a car wreck, then basically kidnapped him. When he tried to escape, what happened? Does anyone remember what she did? PULL THE SLEDGE HAMMER OUT She hobbled him.
That’s what Jesus as talking about. GET EXCITED Don’t hobble him. Don’t discourage him. Don’t make him lose his excitement. Who cares if he does not do it exactly like you do (or want to do).
He is doing the work I told you to do. In Acts 5:38, the wise Pharisee who trained Saul said God doesn’t need us to defend his name. He is quite capable of that.

This makes me think about something else. This is actually very common today. Some of the greatest achievements were made because people pushed on thru the attacks and criticism they received. Examples: Why would you want one of those out of control horseless buggies when you have a perfectly good horse.

Or no one but the government needs any kind of computer, especially in each home. Or why would anyone want a no frills, short haul airline? Southwest will go out of business quickly. Oh, and age has nothing to do with it. Frank Lloyd Wright did his best work at 70. Alfred Hitchcock got it all together around 60. And Beethoven’s 9th was written when he was 50.

Then Jesus talks about 4 sins or 4 paths that can lead to destruction. He talks about the path of manipulation in “if anyone leads one of these little ones astray”. This can be by manipulation or by example. The best example I have of this is a “stupid thief” story I read the other day. This guy wanted to make it easy to break into houses. So he takes his little brother along to crawl in the doggie door, and then unlock the door. No breaking windows or anything like that.
The problem was when his little brother got too big for the doggie door and got stuck. They got caught. Big brother was a bad example.

The next one is ‘if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off.’ Man that sounds extreme (not to mention painful). What does Jesus mean? Of course we could mention the stupid thief again and him stealing. But what about idleness?

That is, what about those who sit back and don’t try to make a difference? A couple weeks ago I took more than 15 bags of food and over $100 to Waxahachie Care Food Bank from this church. That is making a difference. You have to ask now, how can we as Sardis UMC make a difference again? What is the next step?

Then Jesus says ‘if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off’. Your feet will take you. They will either take you down the path of righteousness where Jesus says ‘follow me to the party. I’m taking the Good News to this group over here. We’re going to have a feast.’ OR, your feet will take you the other way. The ‘other way’ is destruction or can be the status quo. Nothing changes much there. It’s convenient and not scary. IBM was the first to mass produce personal computers. They knew what everyone needed and wanted. Then Dell and others came along with the ‘build to order’ plan. Now IBM doesn’t even make computers anymore.
And now if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. Let me tell you how your eyes can lead you astray. Last night about 9:30 as I was typing on the computer I heard a loud crash in the other room. I jumped up and rushed out of the office to see what’s up, yelling at the girls “what happened? Are you OK?” I made it to the hallway and turned on the light and looked into the living room. The gerbil cage was on the floor broken open with the cat pouncing on a gerbil. The eyes had led the cat astray to temptation and she jumped at the chance, literally. In my house-shoes I start chasing the cat, yelling at it. “Stop Katrina. Come here Katrina.” I finally corner the cat and she drops the gerbil who runs into the AC closet. Oh my, this is bad. That closet leads to an opening under the bathtub. I open the door and there is the gerbil. I pick it up, and it’s so happy to be free and safe from the cat, PAUSE that it bites me. We did finally get both the gerbils back in the cage and put away. Oh the temptation that the cat saw was just too great to pass up.

Everyone will be salted with fire, Jesus says. That is, all four of those things he just talked about, the chance for manipulation or setting bad examples, being idle with your hands and not trying to make a difference, walking away, and temptation thru your eyes. These can all happen to you.


But how do they affect you? Do you give in? You can’t. Turn away from the temptation. Here’s why….it works both ways. If you turn from it, it will be easier each time after that.
If you give in once, the 2nd and 3rd time will be harder to turn. The 4th will be even harder. Then the salt loses its saltiness. HUH? The salt loses its saltiness. That means you’ve turned to the sin (small, medium, large it doesn’t matter), you’ve turned in to the sin so many times that it’s a part of your life.

I’ve been told it takes 14-21 days to form a habit. It takes a lot more days to break it. When that sin (sin is not doing what God has said you should do), when you keep doing, or not doing, it will become part of life and not affect your conscience any more. The saltiness is gone.
I’ve got good news though. I’ve seen what this church can do. I know what kind of difference you and you and you can make. Where are we going now? What do you want to build today? What kind of legacy do you want to leave with this church?

I want you to pray and seek guidance from God this week on that very thing. What is the future of Sardis UMC and where are YOU in the picture? Then act on the answer. Everybody I talk to I tell them this is a model church. There’s no power struggle. There’s no bickering.
When I come in and stretch you, you grow. It doesn’t matter if we are 40, 400, 4000, or 40,000 in worship we can transform this area for the one who sent us, Jesus Christ.
When you come up for communion today, ask God for a picture of the future of Sardis UMC. Ask him to guide your legacy and the legacy of this church. Ask for wisdom……… and ask for endurance to run the race before us all. Join me on page 13.