October 13, 2021 - Midweek Message

Pastor Tritten · October 13, 2021 - Midweek Message

 

Midweek Messages

October 13, 2021

This week’s sermon will be:

Entrusted with the Kingdom of God

This week’s readings are:

Ecclesiastes 5:10-20

Hebrews 4:1-13

Mark 10:23-31

Psalm 119:9-16

The Gospel follows immediately from last week’s reading of the young man who asked Jesus, “What must I do to inherit eternal life.”

People like to use this passage to skewer the wealthy.

-        Wealth and oppression of the poor is not the point of this passage.

o   There is plenty in the Scriptures about the oppression of the poor.

o   The Scriptures also present wealth as a blessing from God.

o   Poor-ness is not more sanctified than rich-ness.

o   The point is where does one put his/her confidence, and the rich have an additional temptation here.

-        Perspective: Most (if not all) of my hearers are comparatively rich.

o   Haitian nurses - $200/mo., $2400/year.

o   Nurses in the U.S. average $75,000/year plus benefits.

Jesus’ message in Mark starts with: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” (Mark 1:14-15)

In Mark 10 we are seeing how different the kingdom of God is from our normal assumptions about life – assumptions rooted in the logic of this world.

-        Divorce

-        Children

-        Wealth

This section is followed by Jesus foretelling his death for the third time and a request for places of power and glory for James and John in Jesus’ kingdom.

-        Their minds are formed by the world.

-        Our minds are formed by the world.

Mark 10 is first and foremost about the kingdom of God and how we relate to it.

-        Keep the Law?

-        Be important?

-        Be wealthy?

-        Faith!

o   Faith will form our relationship with these other issues, too, but as fruit growing from a tree, not as a work to secure one’s place in the kingdom of God.

 

We are entrusted with God’s kingdom.

-        Not a place – a relationship.

-        God’s reign – REIGN – kingly activity

-        God’s mercy and salvation, his attitude and actions of love and forgiveness in Christ.

 

This is what we have been entrusted with to deliver to the world.

-        Not politics.

-        Not economics.

-        Not even morality – which we often judge by the world’s standards instead of God’s.

-        We are given the kingdom to spread it’s love and salvation, and its power to transform sinners.