Deo Gloria
Sermon for July 21, 2024
Pastor Martin Bentz
Text: Mark 6:30-34
Theme: Serve with the Compassion of Christ!
Your infant daughter has been sick for the past few days. She hasn’t gotten much sleep and you haven’t either. Even coffee isn’t doing the trick anymore. You’re beat. You’re exhausted. Your nerves are more than a bit frazzled. You finally get her to sleep and you’re getting ready to go to sleep yourself—and she wakes up and starts crying. You’ve got to be kidding. You just want to scream. You’ve hardly slept for 3 days. What do you do?
You’ve been up since 4 a.m. You’re exhausted after putting in another long day at work, another 12 hour day. You finally get home and catch a bite to eat. And now you have a few minutes to relax before going to bed—and the phone rings. It’s your mother-in-law. She tells you that her toilet isn’t working. It won’t flush. There’s water spilling over on the floor. And she needs you to come over right away. What do you do?
It’s been a long week. Lots going on at work. Lots of children’s activities—baseball games, soccer games. Lot’s of housework and yard work. It’s Friday night and you’re looking forward to a nice, relaxing evening with your family. And the doorbell rings. It’s your neighbor. Apparently her husband tripped on the steps and may have broken his ankle. She has to take him to the emergency room and they need someone to stay with their kids until they get back. What do you do? Or maybe the better question is: Where do you find the strength and the motivation to do what you know you should do, but you really don’t feel like it? Well, maybe Jesus can help.
As we heard in last week’s gospel lesson, Jesus had sent out his disciples in pairs of two on a short term missionary trip. He gave them his authority to drive out demons and to heal those who were sick and to proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God in the towns and villages of Galilee. So now they had just returned from their missionary journeys and they were eager to tell Jesus all about it, how it all went. As Mark tells us, “they gathered around Jesus and reported to him all they had done and taught.” At least, they were trying to, but Jesus was busy, crazy busy. If you’re a teacher, this was like the first week of school. If you work in retail, this was like Black Friday. If you work in the hospital or the medical field, this was like the first several months of COVID. It was crazy. There were so many people coming and going that they didn’t even have a chance to eat. So Jesus suggested that they take a little time off and get away for a bit. “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place,” he says, “and get some rest”(v. 31). So they just climbed in a boat and left.
Can you relate? Have you ever been that tired, so tired that you didn’t even bother packing a bag, so tired you just climbed in the car and left? “Hey, hun, it’s been a long week and I’m just exhausted. How about we get away for the weekend?”
“Ah, sure, where do you want to go?”
“I don’t know and I don’t care. We’ll figure it out when we get there. Let’s just go.” Have you ever been that tired, that mentally and physically exhausted? Jesus and his disciples were.
So they got in a boat and set sail for the other side of the Sea of Galilee. But there was one small problem: The people saw them leaving. And they noticed which direction they were headed. So they decided they were going too. As Mark tells us, they ran on foot to the other side of the Sea of Galilee and got there ahead of them. And it wasn’t just them. Apparently word spread as they were making their way to the other side of the lake. People asked them where they were going. They told them they were going to see Jesus and they should come along too. And they did. And pretty soon people were coming all the towns and all the villages all along the way. So when Jesus and the disciples finally arrived on the other side of the lake, here was a large crowd of people, just waiting for them. In fact, as we find out later on this chapter, there were some 5,000 men there, not to mention women and children. So we’re probably talking double that number—somewhere in the neighborhood of 10,000 people, an enormous crowd. Can you imagine the disciples’ reaction as they pulled up on shore and climbed out of the boat? Can you imagine the muttering under their breath? “You’ve got to be kidding! This is exactly what we wanted to get away from—to get a little break, to get a little rest. And now look. The crowd is bigger than ever.”
And then notice Jesus’ reaction: “When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion of them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd”(v. 34). For me as a pastor, this is another one of those stories in the Bible that proves beyond the shadow of a doubt that Jesus truly is the Son of God. Why? Because I know that’s not how I would have reacted. If something like that would have happened on our recent vacation, if all of you would have followed us and got there ahead us, so when we pulled in the driveway of our friends’ place in Wisconsin or our friend’s place in Michigan and all of you would have been there waiting for us, I know how I would have reacted. I mean, don’t get me wrong, we love you all, and I’m sure we would have been waving and smiling. But under my breath I probably would have been muttering something like, “What are you doing here? This is supposed to be our vacation.” And I probably would have been a little frustrated and even a little irritated—but not Jesus. In spite of the fact that this was supposed to be his vacation, his time away with his disciples, he wasn’t frustrated at all or irritated. He wasn’t muttering anything under his breath. Instead his heart went out to them and he was filled with compassion for them. And not only that, not only is he filled with compassion for these people, he then proceeds to conduct Bible Class for them, spontaneously, off the cuff, for hours at time, teaching them the truths of the kingdom of heaven. And if that wasn’t enough, as we find out later on in the chapter, the people made the trip to this rather remote location and didn’t bring any food. So Jesus ends up providing a meal for them too, a miraculous meal, so they all have plenty to eat before heading back home. That is nothing short of amazing. That is nothing short of super-human compassion, the kind of love and compassion only God himself could have. That is the love and compassion of Jesus Christ, our Savior.
Isn’t it comforting to know that Jesus has that kind of compassion, that he has that kind of love and concern for people, including people like you and me? I know I don’t deserve that kind of love and concern from Jesus. I know because of all the wrongs I’ve done in my life, all the sins I have committed, all the times I’ve said and done the very things God has told me not to do, I don’t deserve any compassion from Jesus. I don’t deserve any love and concern. What I deserve is to be ignored. What I deserve is to be left out. What I deserve is to be shut out from God’s love and mercy and compassion for the rest of forever. Same thing true of you?
But that isn’t the way Jesus treats us, not at all. He doesn’t treat us as our sins deserve. He doesn’t ignore us. He doesn’t blow us off. He doesn’t tell us he’s too busy. When he cry out to him on the cell phone of prayer, we never get a busy signal or a message telling us he’s gone on vacation and won’t be back in the office till next week. No, he’s always there for us. And just as he did with the crowd of people in this story, he has compassion on us too. So he is already ready to listen, always ready to comfort, always ready to encourage, always ready to help, always ready to heal and renew our tired and weary and broken hearts. In fact, he had so much love and compassion for you and for me that he went to the cross and laid down his own life in payment for our sins, so that we might never be separated from the love of God, but that we might enjoy his love and compassion in this life and forever in heaven.
Here is where we find compassion to serve the people in our lives. Here is where we find the strength and the heart and the kindness to serve others even when we’re tired or frazzled or our tank is running on empty. We find it in Jesus Christ, our Savior, the one who had unlimited compassion for people, the one who has unlimited compassion for you and me.
So when your daughter wakes up crying in the middle of the night again, what do you do? You say a quick prayer for patience and love and serve with the compassion of Christ. When your mother-in-law calls because she needs help fixing her toilet, what do you do? You say a quick prayer for patience and love and serve with the compassion of Christ. And when your neighbor interrupts your Friday night family night and asks you to watch her children while she takes her husband to the ER, what do you do? You say a quick prayer for patience and love and serve with the compassion of Christ. Amen.