Hugh and special guest Lance Fessler break down Jesus Feeding the 4000 in Mark 8:1-13, discussing the danger of desiring signs and wonders.
The Midweek
Scripture or Signs?
(soft music) - Hello, church family, and welcome back to another episode of The Midweek. We are going to be diving into the texts that we looked at from this past Sunday. We were in the book of Mark again, starting in chapter eight, verse one, all the way through verse 13. So if you haven't listened to that, I encourage you to go ahead and do so. You can access that on YouTube, or wherever you get your regular podcasts. Today, we are joined by a special guest, Lance Fessler. He is from SGM, Spread of Grace Ministries. And this is a man who has been pouring into our staff and our elders over the last several months, just teaching us and training us in the word of God. So Lance, thanks so much for joining us today. Would you just tell us a little bit about yourself and about what SGM is doing? - Well, I'd love to thank you, Hugh. It's just a blessing to be here. As far as myself personally, I grew up in this area, moved out to Los Angeles. The Lord saved me out there. And I spent 15 years at Grace Community Church under Pastor John MacArthur out there. And then came back to this area again. And I've been with Spread of Grace for the last four years. And what we do at Spread of Grace is not only internationally, but now locally, is we're teaching pastors how to study, believe, and preach the Bible with an emphasis on expository preaching, preaching the way that we saw Ezra do in the book of Nehemiah. And trusting the word of God is the final authority for all that we do and how we live and just understanding the Bible in context. And yet, just thanks for being here. Just a blessing to be at harvest, just a blessing to see what God's doing here and just the effect of the ministry and the people that are pouring into this local body. It's just so exciting to be part of what you're doing here. So thank you for having me. - Of course, yeah, thank you so much for joining us. And yeah, I echo all the statements that you've made, just super encouraged by the work that the Lord is doing here in our local body. And I pray that each one of us would take up our war and continue to row in that direction for the glory of God and the proclamation of his gospel. And Sunday, we continued in that theme. And even through the message, we saw the gospel very clearly. And so we've got another miracle here of Jesus where this time Jesus is feeding the 4,000. We saw him feed the 5,000 earlier in the book of Mark. And now we've got another miracle that's very similar. And again, with all these miracles, Lance, I think it's important for us to recognize, okay, Mark wrote this down, this second miracle that was very similar for a reason. So just walk us through. Why did Mark give us this passage to these particular people? He wrote this down obviously for a specific audience. So just walk us through that a little bit. - Well, we know the gospel of Mark is written to primarily Gentiles. That is his audience that he wrote it to. He wrote it approximately 50 A.D. So a short time after the life-death resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ, we know that Mark was a companion of Paul, that he was also studied under Peter. And then again, at the end of Paul's life, he was called upon to come into minister with Paul. So Mark had some pretty unique experiences and some pretty amazing teachers. But he's really fixated and focused on allowing Gentile. That is non-Jews to understand who Jesus Christ is and what he has done and why he is Lord and Savior. That's really the primary thrust of the book of Mark. And what we see in this feeding of 4,000, and I know that there are many commentators that believe that liberal commentators that believe that maybe this is just a repeat of the same miracle. And it's not even remotely close to that. We know the first miracle was to a Jewish audience, an audience that would have known and understood the word of God and should have known and understood that what God was doing in that miracle was actually fulfilling his promises of the coming Messiah. But now we have this group that is about 4,000 and what we find again is that this amazing miracle is now being directed toward Gentiles. I've actually been in this area where the Decapolis is at and you can see the architecture there and all the pagan worship that was going on there. But what we also know is that there was a synagogue there. So the word of God was present there and it was being proclaimed by faithful Jews who believed that what they had in the Old Testament was authoritative. So there would have been an understanding of at least some understanding of the Messiah. And what we also see is why these people assembled. What we know if we look back in chapter seven, which obviously gives us a better context, that he has been performing miracles. So obviously they're interested in seeing who this Jesus is and why he is doing what he's doing, sure. - Yeah, and like you said, that little bit of context, just reading back a few verses earlier, we know that Jesus has been here before. He's performed miracles in this region before and so he would have been well known at this point and you're right, people were curious and they would want to know who he was and he put that on full display for the people. We see in the first two points here, that Justin brought before us were the compassion of Christ and the capacity of Christ. So we see the issue at hand, the miracle that needed to be provided were these people were hungry. They had nothing to eat. Jesus provides that for them and he has the capacity to do that. And so Lance, just talk us through the miracle at first and then we'll get into the response of the Pharisees and then into kind of our main thrust for our application. But just talk us through that miracle. Obviously, this is a good correlation. We see people in need Christ of filling that need and obviously we kind of mirroring effects for us with Christ of filling our greatest need, which would be, of course, salvation. - Well, I think it's important to see in the context one is that, and Justin pointed out that he had compassion for the crowd. And I think the compassion not only comes through the feeding, which is something that we see here, but more than that, that he actually spends three days with a Gentile audience teaching them, right? So imagine three days of hearing from Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, proclaiming the word of God, preaching about the kingdom of God. And we go all the way back to chapter one in Mark and Jesus himself says that the kingdom of God is at hand and that he's calling any and all who hear this message to repent and to place their trust in him. So the arrival of the kingdom has come at this point in redemptive history. And when we think of that, we think all the way back to the book of Genesis, chapter three, verse 15, where the first gospel is proclaimed after the fall and you think of Adam and Eve. Now, they were not Jews. They were just sinners. - Right. - Right. - And God is promising salvation to any and all when his Messiah comes and he proclaims that in Genesis three. And as we're watching redemptive history work itself out, we find ourselves here in this text and an amazing point where we see God's compassion. And what I would say is when you see the compassion of Christ, you're seeing the compassion of God the Father, right? And that's really what we're understanding, not only that God is interested in telling people the truth according to the scriptures, but they's also meeting their physical needs. - Right. - You know, I think sometimes there's a disconnect, especially in our culture where we're looking to God to help us with our material needs. And oftentimes my prayers and maybe your prayers are about temporal things. - Mm-hmm, right. - But we really are missing the spiritual aspect of it. And when you look at what's going on in chapter eight, you really have to understand that the spiritual aspect is the primary concern, the physical concern. So like the tail on the dog, it comes along. - Yes, with the bigger theme. And just the blessing of what God is doing here through his son, but also how he's going to be utilizing the disciples. - Mm-hmm, yeah. Yeah, and I think that's such an important aspect to point out that obviously, the main theme here that a lot of people would maybe just take away is they see the letterhead and they see Jesus feeds the 4,000. They would think that the miracle here is just Christ providing and the Father having compassion on their physical needs. But as you say, the greater concern is the heart. And we see that all throughout redemptive history, you can go all the way back into the Old Testament where one of our harvest kids' memory verses has been, the man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart. And that's been a constant theme throughout redemptive history. And we see that here again, this is, Jesus has been teaching them for three days before he gets to this point where it's like, okay, we should feed them. We should also provide for them now. And then yeah, as you said at the end there, it's interesting the role that the disciples have to play. And we see Jesus constantly when he's doing these miracles or he's teaching, he's also so concerned about the disciples and training them up so that they're ready to take over when he leaves. So talk us through that and his relationship with the disciples here in this passage. - Well, I think you wanna look at the text and we see something here that is sort of glaring, but I think we can pass by it. When he realized he has compassion, he is explaining the need to the disciples. Now, I want you to understand that the Jews and the Gentiles despised each other. You know, I think in our culture, you know, unfortunately in the political realm, Republicans and Democrats really can despise each other. And the reality is, or even Christians and those from Islam, right? But what Jesus never did is he never cast out those who were lost in their sin. - Right. - And what he's teaching the disciples here is that these Gentiles are actually the mission field, not the enemy. - Yeah. - And we go back to chapter seven and we see where the Syrophoenician women in verse 28, she answers Jesus about begging for a miracle for her daughter. And she says, but she answered him, yes, Lord, that even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs. So she's asking the Lord to do something that only the Lord can do. And she's acknowledging herself as being a dog, which was a reference to Gentiles by the Jews, but making a connection between the fact that the children even get the crumbs. - Yep. - Now we fast forward over to chapter eight when Jesus is dealing with this problem of physical hunger. And I love this, he says in verse four, and his disciples answered him, how can one feed these people with bread here in this desolate place? So obviously, no, he can do that. - Right. - Now, do they have amnesia? No, no, they don't have amnesia, but they're again not understanding fully and completely who Jesus is, right, at this point in the ministry. But I love this, he says, and he asked them, how many loaves do you have? See, they realize that salvation is for the Jews. - Right. - And they're willing to accept that, that he will be the Jewish Messiah, but now he's asking them to share their food with Gentiles. - Yeah. - And let's just say, quite frankly, that wouldn't happen in those times. - Right, right. - And so he's asking them to share the very thing that is most important, which was one, the teaching, but now he's making practical application for them to have them give what they have, which would be their sustenance to these Gentiles. - Yeah, and how encouraging would that have been for the audience of this book, those Gentiles in Rome to read something like this, have probably heard throughout their life that, obviously the Jews are the special chosen people and they have this disdain for all of their Gentiles. But then reading this and seeing the care that Jesus has, the specific instruction that, like you said, these people aren't the enemy anymore. These people are the mission field, and there is an opportunity to share, obviously, that the sustenance here in the form of bread, but also, as you said, right, the mission field for the gospel. Yeah, so let's continue to move on here. Let's look at the response then to this miracle. And we see from the Pharisees here, verse 11, says, "The Pharisees came and began to argue with him, seeking from him a sign from heaven to test him." Jesus responds, he says, "And he sighed deeply in his spirit and said, 'Why does this generation seek of sign, truly I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation?' And he left them, got into the boat again, and went to their side." So when it's, talk us through here, what are we seeing here? Obviously, Jesus just performs a miracle. And then the Pharisees come to him directly after, asking for a sign to prove that he's the Lord. What's happening here? And why does Jesus respond the way that he does? Well, again, we need to understand where we're at in redemptive history, right? This is the earthly ministry of Jesus Christ, that this is the promised Messiah, and that what God has promised, he's actually done, right? And Jesus himself, by performing these signs and wonders, specifically healing the blind and allowing the lame to walk and feeding the hungry. These things were all things that were promised in the Old Testament that the Messiah would actually do. And what God has promised, Jesus has done, right? So all these signs have been fulfilled. And I think of maybe a simple illustration, and we talked about this earlier. One of my favorite places, actually my favorite place to go on the whole planet is Canobles Grove. And for us that are locals, many of us, that's just like the destination, right? We can't wait for it to be warm enough, we can't wait to get there. So from my house to Canobles Grove, I think there's, I counted them, there were nine signs, right? And every one of them, it's telling you where you're going, it's telling you how far you have to go. But the reality is, is once I get there, once I actually put my car, park it in the parking lot, it's abundantly clear that I'm gonna go in and I'm going to enjoy what Canobles Grove has to offer. Now, when you're thinking of that illustration, and you look at the Pharisees, again, demanding a sign, Jesus already fulfilled the promises of God, of who he would be. It would be like me packing my family back up in the car, driving them back to one of the signs on the side, right, and I'm hugging the sign, right, right? And saying this is what I came to see was the sign. I mean, that is obviously ridiculous as far as an illustration, but it's also ridiculous that the Pharisees would even think that they would want to see a sign at this point in the ministry, right, after all that he's done. And I think that's the sorrow and the sadness of those who can be religious, is that they do not trust the word of God, right, and that they, of them by themselves, create a religion not based on the authority of God's word and where they're at in redemptive history, but where they want to be at, right? And we know elsewhere in scripture that Jesus says about this requested sign that no other sign will be given, except the sign of Jonah speaking of his resurrection, right? And that really was the bottom line of the bottom line, like it doesn't matter how many miracles that I show you, you not only will not believe, but you cannot believe because of the hardness of your heart. - Right, yeah, and that's just, man, we see that over and over again throughout scripture, maybe none better than the example of Pharaoh, where his heart was hardened to the point where 10 miracles in, even the death of his own son, doesn't convince him that God is God. And some people, like you say, just will not believe despite whatever they see. You can take them right to the sign, you can take them right to Knobles Grove, and they will not believe, right? And so that's kind of the thing for us and modern day. It's like, okay, so we see this story, how do we apply this to ourselves? And as you mentioned there, we have the surest word, we have scripture, and that is everything that we possibly could need in order to see, to hear and believe. You know, 2 Timothy chapter three, verse 16 and 17 says, all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction and for training and righteousness, that the man of God may be what may be complete, equipped for every good work. And so there's no necessity to be looking for these signs, looking for these wonders. And Lance, unfortunately, in the church today, we see a large movement right now where people are looking for signs, looking for wonders to kind of confirm a spiritual reality or a spiritual presence, when that's so clearly counter-biblical. - Yeah. You know, it's sad that that is where many people are at, really not understanding redemptive history, right? And anybody that would see me standing along the side of the road hugging a sign, preferring that over being in canobles, would probably think I need to be institutionalized, right? But for us to want to go back to a time of signs and miracles and wonders and expecting those things would be to say that the crucifixion wasn't sufficient, that the resurrection wasn't sufficient, that the ascension wasn't sufficient, and that just diminishes the entire work of God in redemptive history. And really, the bottom line is it's always at the expense of the proclamation of the gospel, isn't it? - Right, right. - So that people are looking to themselves, they're looking to God to meet their temporal needs, rather than understanding that the role and the responsibility of the church is what Jesus says, that we're to go and proclaim the gospel, right? And that that is really the primary place that we're at in redemptive history. Now, does God continue to do miracles? Of course he does. - Sure, sure. - Of course he does. But he doesn't need Peter, he doesn't need Paul, he doesn't need Hugh, he doesn't need Lance to do those things that there are no individuals that do those things anymore. And these false teachers that say that they do these things, they really, either they just don't understand the word of God, or they've thrust it aside and have determined to be God themselves. - Absolutely. - And they're very dangerous, and unfortunately, they're in our community. - Yeah. - But again, they're our mission field. - Yeah, right? - Amen. - Yeah, they're our mission field. - Absolutely. Yeah, and so for us as a church, I mean, obviously the onus is on us to be in our Bibles, know them, study them. And then when we do meet this opposition, when we meet these people that are our mission field, we're prepared and we're ready. And again, going back to that passage in Second Timothy where it says, "All scripture is breathed out by God." And then what does it say? It gives us a long list of all of these things that scripture is good for. And so if we're not in the word of God, we're not gonna be prepared when those opportunities come up when the mission field is right before us. And so as a church, Justin has done a great job of ending pretty much every message he preaches with, be in your Bible, know the word, and then preach the gospel to the community. And that's the focus, that's what we should be doing. And Lance, as you said, that in redemptive history, that's our priority right now, that's our role to be witnesses for the Lord. And that's what we should be focusing on, not all of these other things that so many people unfortunately focus on. - And that's the theme of spread of grace ministries is the word of God does the work of God in the people of God through the spirit of God for the glory of God, but getting back to the word, getting back to understanding where we're at in redemptive history and what our role is. And yeah, Harvest Church is doing it, right? And over and over and over again, we're finding that it's people in the congregation that are proclaiming the gospel and bringing other people into the body of Christ. And that is what we're called to do. And Justin and you and Matt and Cole and the elders are equipping the saints for the work of this ministry and praise God. That's what we so desperately need in our community, isn't it? - Amen, amen, absolutely. Well, Lance, thank you so much for taking time to help us break down this passage. It was a pleasure speaking about the word with you. And Church, I hope you appreciated that as much as I did. So we're gonna be continuing on in the book of Mark this coming week, so we're gonna be picking up in verse 14, gonna be going on from that next section there. So study up on that, be prepared for when you come on Sunday. Thank you so much for listening and we hope to see you then. (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music) You [BLANK_AUDIO]