PONDERING... Do You Need A Sign? (Mark 8:11-26)

Do You Need A Sign? (AM Sermon Notes)

GIST: You are spiritually blind by nature, and only Jesus can open your eyes, so let Him.

SCRIPTURE: Mark 8:11-26

11 The Pharisees came and began to argue with him, seeking from him a sign from heaven to test him. 12 And he sighed deeply in his spirit and said, “Why does this generation seek a sign? Truly, I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation.” 13 And he left them, got into the boat again, and went to the other side.

14 Now they had forgotten to bring bread, and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. 15 And he cautioned them, saying, “Watch out; beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.”16 And they began discussing with one another the fact that they had no bread. 17 And Jesus, aware of this, said to them, “Why are you discussing the fact that you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? 18 Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear? And do you not remember? 19 When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?” They said to him, “Twelve.” 20 “And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?” And they said to him, “Seven.” 21 And he said to them, “Do you not yet understand?”

22 And they came to Bethsaida. And some people brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him. 23 And he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village, and when he had spit on his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, “Do you see anything?” 24 And he looked up and said, “I see people, but they look like trees, walking.” 25 Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again; and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. 26 And he sent him to his home, saying, “Do not even enter the village.”

We’re moving toward a turning point in Mark. Most people agree that there are essentially two major parts in this Gospel. The first part answers the question “who is Jesus?”. Next week, we’ll see the climax of this section in Peter’s confession that Jesus is, indeed, the Christ, the Messiah. The second half then focuses on the question “why did He come?”. We’ll see this definitively answered in His death and resurrection, which, Lord willing, we’ll get to at some point in your lifetime☺.

So, leading up to this turning point of sorts, we have these last three accounts that seem all interconnected. The Pharisees come to Jesus with the pretense of wanting a more specific sign. Then, the disciples completely miss out on some signs, again. And then, Jesus heals this man in such a way that it functions as a sign of everyone missing out on all the other signs☺. I think there’s a message here for us. And man, it’s relevant. I’m preaching this message from a manger scene! (Which is awesome, by the way.) Tonight, we’re celebrating the birth of Christ with our Children’s Program. All around us this time of year, there are messages that point to who Jesus is and why He came, yet so often we still miss the truth. So, today’s gist? You are spiritually blind by nature, and only Jesus can open your eyes, so let Him.

I. You Are Spiritually Blind By Nature (Me too)

We see this demonstrated with two groups in these passages: the religious elite, many of whom seem to remain permanently in this state, and the disciples, most of whom (Judas excluded) do not.

Pharisees. Let’s start with the Pharisee’s then. Jesus has just fed the 4,000+, and He and the disciples cross over the sea of Galilee on their boat and are immediately accosted by the Pharisees. Not an unusual occasion.

What do they want? The text demonstrates their intention immediately; they come and begin arguing with Him. In this argument, they ask for a sign from heaven. They want Jesus to perform some kind of cosmic act to prove His identity. Why do they want it? To test Him. Their motivation isn’t seeing Him for who He really is; they don’t expect Him to be able to perform the sign. They are trying to discredit Him.

So, how does He respond? Well first, He sighs deeply. Why? Because they should have gotten this already (this is becoming a familiar theme, right?). They’re asking for a sign when He’s been clearly showing them who He is all this time! On a far less significant level, teachers will get this. I see situations like this all the time. I might have a due date written on the whiteboard in my room, projected on my 10x10 screen with the “daily agenda”, typed in the syllabus, and posted to their google calendar (which is setup to send them periodic reminders of upcoming events); we might have even been talking about the details of the assignment every day for a three week period (or more). Still, without fail, the day before it’s due, I will have several students ask questions like, “So, what exactly are we supposed to be doing?”, or “When is that due, again?”. Yeah, I sigh deeply a lot. And that’s just a high school English assignment--and I’m just a messed up human teacher. This is eternal salvation being proclaimed by the Savior of world, God in flesh!

So, He sighs, then He refuses to give them the sign. Why? For one, He knew their hearts. They didn’t really want the sign. But also, they’d already been given all the signs they needed, more even. The specific words He used to respond to them were steeped in Old Testament language--and they wouldn’t have missed that. These were the OT scholars. Remember, they knew the words; they just didn’t understand them. What He tells them is reminiscent of God’s rebukes of Israel for rejecting Him or demanding to see more from Him to really believe despite having seen Him work again, and again, and again. In fact, Psalm 95:7-11 is a good example.

7 For he is our God,
   and we are the people of his pasture,
   and the sheep of his hand.
Today, if you hear his voice,
8 do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah,
   as on the day at Massah in the wilderness,
9 when your fathers put me to the test
   and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work.
10 For forty years I loathed that generation
   and said, “They are a people who go astray in their heart,
   and they have not known my ways.”
11 Therefore I swore in my wrath,
   “They shall not enter my rest.”

So, when He says this generation will not be given a sign, He’s not saying there won’t be any more miracles, but, knowing their heart, is condemning their request for a specific sign by referring to them in the same way God did the disobedient Israelites. The truth was right in front of their eyes, but they could not and would not see Him for who He was, so He left them. Let that sink in for a second. This condemnation is clear, and this warning for us is serious.

Disciples. After leaving the Pharisees, Jesus and the disciples get in their boat. Jesus then starts teaching them. They only had one loaf of bread with them, so it’s possible He took this as a visual aid of sorts and held it up as He warned them to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Herod. We’ll come back to the specifics of this warning in a second, but for now, let’s look at how the disciples responded. Remember, we’re looking at spiritual blindness here. Jesus is giving a spiritual lesson, but what do the disciple assume? They think He’s upset because they didn’t bring any bread with them!

Now, this would almost be comical if it wasn’t so sad. Jesus rebukes them with about nine questions (look at verses 17-21). At the core, these questions all point to the same rebuke: you should have gotten this by now (Hm, I feel like I’ve typed this before…). They were just with Him when He fed two multitudes with just a few loaves. You’d think they would have understood He had the bread thing covered! But, this isn’t about bread. These rebukes also have an Old Testament ring to them with reference to unseeing eyes and unhearing ears. He’s warning them not to be blind like the Pharisees, and their response shows...they are.

So, these passages demonstrate our core problem, but they also point to the solution. Ending the message here would be instructive, but not especially helpful...and it’s not where Jesus ends it either.

II. Only Jesus Can Open Your Eyes

Parable Miracle. I want to come back to the nature of the warning here in a second, but first let’s look at this healing miracle. I went back and forth on whether or not to address this passage this week or next, but couldn’t shake the connection here. This miracle kind of mirrors the one we looked at last Sunday night. Incidentally, they’re the only two miracles only recorded by Mark. Last Sunday night, we saw a death-mute being healed by Jesus, and here we have a blind man. It’s not an accident that bookending a rebuke from Jesus about having ears but not hearing and eyes but not seeing, we’re given these two symbolic miracles.

Now, I’ll only briefly mention that the physical nature of this miracle was symbolic for the particular man just like the death-mute. If you were here when we addressed that healing, we pointed out that spit had come to symbolize healing in this culture, so Jesus spat to demonstrate to the man, who could not hear what He was saying, what was about to happen. In like manner, though this man would not have seen the spit, he would have heard the sound and gotten the idea.

More significantly, however, was the symbol being given to the disciples and, by extension, us. And it’s that symbol that is really the more startling part of this miracle. We’ve seen Jesus touch people when He heals them. This is a sign of His intimacy and compassion. These people were outcasts, untouchables, and He intentionally makes the difference in their lives. But if you read this miracle, something else probably strikes you as odd. Why did it take Jesus touching the man twice for his sight to be restored? It’s not because He was incapable of healing him right away. He didn’t “run out of juice”. He was showing the disciples the truth about themselves. They were starting to understand the truth about Him, but their vision was still blurry. Despite being face-to-face with Him, they weren’t really getting the full picture yet. They were like this blind man.

Oh, this is so rich! By nature, they were completely without sight, but because of Jesus they were starting to see. That in itself is a miracle by the way. The fact that this man who was completely without sight even saw vague images is the work of God...and we know it only happened because Jesus touched Him. The same is true of the disciples. They might not see everything fully yet, but they’re starting to see...because of Jesus’ work in their lives.

What’s even better though is Jesus doesn’t leave him with partial sight. He touches him again, and he sees perfectly. There are like nine words used here related to seeing. I think the point being made is pretty clear. You need to see, and that only happens when Jesus touches you (which is His Amazing Grace!).

Jesus’ Warning. Now, given that context, let’s look at Jesus’ warning about the leaven of the Pharisees and Herod. This leaven is unbelief, which is the whole issue here. The Pharisees and Herod were actually political enemies, but, as we saw several weeks ago, had united against Jesus. What connected them was their disbelief in the face of evidence. Herod had been fascinated by John the Baptist and even enjoyed hearing him preach...just not as much as he enjoyed his reputation, so when it came down to choosing between the two, he had John beheaded. Likewise, the Pharisees knew the Old Testament Scripture and had heard Jesus preach and seen Him work miracles. They had all the pieces, but their own traditions and expectations were more important, so they sought to kill Him.

So, Jesus warns the disciples not about forgetting to bring bread on a voyage, but about allowing disbelief to creep into their hearts and take root. And, it can take root very easily in their lives. Why? Because like us, they are spiritually blind by nature, so disbelief is already their default mode. Just like this blind man, they need Jesus’ touch to see.

TAKEAWAYS

We are spiritually blind by nature, and only Jesus can open our eyes. Let Him because...

1. We’re just as prone to forget and doubt. People sometimes question these passages because of disciples disbelief in the face of what appears to be clear evidence. They see two miraculous feedings and still wonder about where they’re going to get bread? Yet, this is 100% reality. We’ve mentioned this point before, but it bares repeating. How often have we seen God move, and still doubt. Often. I’ve seen God miraculously heal my children, but does that stop me from worrying when they’re sick. We’ve seen God heal heartache in our church, but does that stop us from fearing future division? We’ve seen God save the lost, but that stop us from being afraid to share the Gospel?

2. Yet, we have been given all the signs we need.  Romans 1:19-20 “19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.” Do we stand in the face of His evidence and ask for more of a sign? That’s what the Pharisees did, and He left them there. Do you need more of a sign, too?

3. And… blindness is our natural state, but it doesn’t have to be our permanent condition.  Let’s not forget though, the message here isn’t just that we’re blind, but that Jesus came to give sight to the blind. The message of this manger scene that will surround us this time of year is screaming hope. Don’t miss it. I know I quoted this last week, but it’s just so powerful. John 1:9-13 “9 The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. 12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” Come to the only one who can open your eyes.