The Functional Saviour

If you have dabbled in fitness in recent years, and followed some of the language associated with training, you might have heard of the term functional fitness or functional training.

And to hear that now this morning, you might think, well, what isn't functional about exercise?

Well, this particular term relates specifically to exercise that mimics common everyday actions that you need to remain strong to do.

So it might, functional fitness might be about carrying things.

Often we do that in life, or it might be, because at some point you'll need to put a heavy vase up there on the top shelf.

It's lifting things above your head, or often we have a fall or we have to get up off the ground at some point.

So we do some sort of squat technique where you're getting up off the ground.

Functional training.

There's also another term using the word functional that we might hear it.

It's a person's functional saviour.

This refers to anything someone puts their greatest hopes for life in.

They don't realise it's their functional saviour, but it is.

It might be your functional saviour might be your spouse or your hopes to find a spouse.

It could be your job or your salary.

These things are functional saviours because they are meant to save us functionally.

It could be the answer to that prayer that you've been praying, the healing you seek so desperately, unfortunately or maybe fortunately.

At some point in our life, we discover that these things that we long for so much, they can't save us.

They're not actually what we most need.

They can't save you from the problem of sin, and they can't save us from the problem of a life of unfulfillment and a lack of purpose.

There is only one Saviour.

We know that many of us here today.

His name is Jesus, the Lord Jesus Christ.

This morning as we study Mark chapter 2, I'd like to suggest that we do actually have a functional and functioning Saviour.

His name is Jesus and he is a functional Saviour because he truly does save us through his death and resurrection and by faith in that work, he saves us wholly.

Our whole body and soul, spirit, mind, everything will be saved when we put our faith in him.

And out of that, we are saved practically and vocationally and recreationally and relationally and eternally in every way.

He is our true functional Saviour.

Jesus is our true functional Saviour because through faith in Jesus, I have my greatest need fulfilled.

And if you put faith in him, you do too.

Let me read the first few verses that we just heard read by Vera.

Verse 1 of chapter 2 says, A few days later when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home.

They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them.

Some men came bringing to him a paralyzed man carried by four of them.

Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it, and then lowered the mat the man was lying on.

When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, son, your sins are forgiven.

We're not sure where Jesus was living long term.

Of course, he was a travelling itinerant preacher, so he didn't stay a long time in any one place, but it says he came home.

And this is a house, we don't know which house, but it's in Capernaum, which was really his base.

It was a Galilean fishing village at the top left hand side, as you look at a map of the Sea of Galilee.

I don't know if anyone saw The Chosen opening.

Did anyone apart from Sam and Nikita?

A few of us saw it.

The Chosen is this fictional, but based in scripture.

It's a creative retelling of the story of the gospel.

And some of us might have watched it online.

I think it started on YouTube.

I can't remember.

But the other week there was this opening of season four.

And I was interested and I was looking up the guy who plays Jesus.

There was an interview of him.

His name is Jonathan Rumi.

And what the interviewer was asking was, how have things changed since at the start, no one knew about The Chosen, but now four seasons in, a few years on, you're pretty famous.

And he said, yeah, I have to tell people, I'm not actually Jesus, though he has this perfect look, Jewish look, hair about shoulder length.

And I have to say, I'm just Jonathan.

I'm not Jesus.

But he said, what I have noticed in this level of fame that they've experienced is just a smidgen of what Jesus was experiencing when his notoriety went through the roof.

When people just crowded in around Jesus because of what he could do for them.

Jesus has healed many sick people and delivered many from demon possession and now he's drawing large crowds.

The text says they gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door.

And many of us who grew up in Sunday school know the story.

It's a great story.

Four of his very committed friends find a way to get him to the roof, this disabled friend of theirs, a paralysed man and they take him to the roof and then begin to dismantle some of the roof to get him to Jesus.

Now the roof is not like ours.

If you look up archaeological discoveries in Capernaum, would describe typical houses as having roofs of reeds, branches and dried mud and every autumn, before the winter rains, they would have to be re, what do they call it?

Rerolled and rebuilt.

So suffice to say, there was no jackhammers required to get through the roof.

But it certainly would have made a scene, just like it would right here, if as we're here listening and me talking and someone was coming through the roof, it would be quite odd.

Jesus knows what our greatest need is.

Though if you were present in the room and listened to what he said, you could be forgiven for wondering if he did understand the greatest need.

Four friends precariously lower their paralysed friend down on a mat tied somehow in the corners, made into a basket, and they drop him through the roof, bravely jumping the queue to get to the miracle worker.

Now, Jesus' job is easy.

He just has to say, rise, my friend, and be healed.

Everyone else knows what Jesus is meant to do.

His job is obvious.

But Jesus says, at that moment, son, your sins are forgiven.

One can only wonder what the man might have been thinking.

He might have suggested to Jesus, I have a more pressing matter.

I have a more immediate problem.

Yet Jesus is saying, no, you don't.

Isn't that interesting?

Your sin is more pressing than your suffering, as a need that needs to be met.

Jesus is saying to this man, your greatest problem is not what has happened to you.

It's how you have responded to what has happened to you.

It's the most natural thing in all the world, I think, for a human being like any of us, to create a functional saviour.

The language surrounding a functional saviour is, if only I could attain this, or achieve that, or establish this, or be in relationship with him or her, or if I could earn this, if only God would take away my suffering, my problem, that he would fix it, restore my health, then I'd be happy, I'd be whole.

This man is longing to walk, isn't he?

He's longing to be restored to what seems like full functionality.

That's what functional saviours are meant to do, restore us.

But so frequently they can be what?

They become idols.

Functional saviours, if it's not Jesus, and we're putting our full trust in it to do what he should do for us and does do for us, then we're actually allowing an idol, a god, to be put in our view in which we put our trust.

Maybe this young man assumed if he could walk, everything would be different.

What or who is your functional saviour?

And what do you currently put your trust?

Where does your treasure lie?

What is the deepest desire of your heart in this season of life you're finding yourself in?

Jesus cuts straight to what the man needs most.

His greatest need is he needs his sins forgiven and ultimately through his sins forgiven by faith in Jesus and the death and resurrection that is yet to happen.

But he needs his sins forgiven and entry into a relationship with the one who forgave his sins.

That's his greatest need.

He needs his sins forgiven and then to find out how to live like this is the case.

Amen?

It's on the other side of that revelation that I think Jesus is communicating.

We find life, peace, love and joy.

At least we can say that from the hindsight we have of the whole New Testament.

I think it's confronting.

It's a confronting statement that I've just made.

It's confronting for me to think about it, to say that my prayer for healing could be a functional Saviour for me because it may have taken my soul focus.

Everything is about just getting that answer to prayer.

It's not that we're not allowed to pray and desire all sorts of things, but the question that we have today is, has that thing become my functional Saviour?

Knowing the true functional Saviour will teach us about my point number 2, the gift and mystery of faith.

Verse 5 says, When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralysed man, Son, your sins are forgiven.

This passage is an odd passage.

It's caused a little bit of a stir throughout history and the thinking about theology, because it's an outlier.

It's pretty much the only spot you find someone getting forgiven without demonstrating repentance.

He just gets told, your sins are forgiven, no repentance.

What is Mark doing here?

I think there is a hint, and it's in verse 8, it says Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking.

He's talking about the teachers of the law there, but I think you get this idea that Jesus knew in the recesses of the paralysed man's heart and mind there was a longing of faith.

There was a deep and profoundly authentic desire to find mercy and grace from God.

It's all we can assume.

Jesus, it would seem, responded to the fragmentary desires of this man's heart and offers faith as a gift.

He offers forgiveness as a gift.

The process of someone becoming a Christian, have you found it is slightly confusing?

Theologically at least, if you read the different ways that smart, godly people have tried to understand how does someone get saved, on one hand you have, it's just a pure gift from god.

The faith itself is a gift.

And that comes from an understanding that we're born sinful and we're sinful all throughout life.

And there's no way we could ever respond.

But there are so many other scriptures in the New Testament.

And I think through the old as well, that talk about a person being morally accountable for their decisions.

And they need to actually exercise their will and believe and put their faith in Christ, repent.

Is it one or the other?

Is it only a gift or is it only something that is by the act of the will of a human being?

I think it's a complex and mysterious mystery.

Is there free will?

Yes.

Is it a gift of God?

Here I think we find an example of what we might call the aggressive grace of the Lord Jesus.

That might sound strange, but it's a wonderful thought.

Can I encourage you, if you are teetering on the edge of faith, lean in another centimetre.

Lean into God, lean towards Him, lean towards Jesus as Lord and Saviour, and He will enliven your heart.

He will take just the smidgens of faith that you have, because He's already postured towards receiving you.

Hallelujah.

He is.

That's what our Saviour is like.

Faith is both a gift and a mysterious act of the will.

The reason Jesus is absolutely eager to receive your and my tiniest level of faith is because He really is the Saviour of the world.

That's why.

It's pretty obvious.

He's already died on the cross for us, and He's risen again from the grave.

The tomb is empty.

He really is our Saviour.

Receive Him by faith.

Receive Him by faith.

He is our true functional as in real functioning Saviour, because He went to a cross to die in our place.

We have a real Saviour who does what is harder throughout Mark's Gospel of New Beginnings.

This passage is the first time, we're only a chapter in, but it's the first time there is a pushback against Jesus.

Up until now, He's doing the miracles.

He's casting demons out.

He's setting captives free.

He's drawing crowds.

He may be the long-awaited political liberator, the Messiah, but here is the first time we see the long and dark and scary shadow of the cross.

It's creeping over His life.

Some teachers of the law, verse 6, were sitting there thinking to themselves, why does this fellow talk like that?

He is blaspheming.

This is the first moment, the first pushback.

Who can forgive sins but God alone?

Immediately, Jesus knew in His Spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and He said to them, why are you thinking these things, which is easier to say, to say to this paralysed man, your sins are forgiven, or to get up, to say, get up, take your mat, and walk?

Well, I think the teachers of the law are dead right in what they are saying, aren't they?

Who can forgive sins but God alone?

This is true at a theological level and a relational level.

Theologically, God the Creator is the judicial keeper of the moral laws of the universe.

And so as the cosmic judge of the world, only he can forgive sins.

Tick, what they said is actually true.

But it's also true on a relational level.

Like if you think of three people, these names, Tom, Rod and Ollie.

You imagine Tom is a little bit aggressive and he punches Rod.

Punches him in the nose, like the cartoon would have him do.

And Rod is a little offended and he's quite hurt actually.

He's injured and so Tom and Rod have a dislocated relationship and Ollie thinks he's going to fix it.

So Ollie comes up and says, Tom, I want you to know I forgive you for punching me in the face.

And Tom is going to think, what?

I didn't punch you in the face, Ollie.

How can you, Ollie, come and forgive me for what I did to Rod?

There's only one way Ollie logically could forgive Tom for what he did to Rod.

And what is that?

If Ollie was Rod.

It's the only logical way, relationally.

And in fact, that's exactly what is happening here.

That's the key.

That when Jesus comes and says, your sins are forgiven, sins that have been done against the holiness of Yahweh, your God, it's because they were done against me.

Because I and the Father are one.

It's an extraordinary statement that Jesus is making here.

Your sins are forgiven because I can do so.

Jesus is a real Saviour who will do what is harder, which is easier, verse 9, to say to this paralysed man, your sins are forgiven, or to say, get up, take your mat and walk.

At first glance, most of us would assume the obvious, and maybe that is the truth.

It's easier to speak words that can't be checked, that can't be proven.

Your sins are forgiven.

Easy to say.

Much harder to heal a person's body upon demand.

But the truth is, it's far harder to die for the sin of the world, because to do so you would have to have said no to every temptation you had ever faced.

To be perfect, that's hard.

To do so, you would have to have left heaven and become a human baby to slowly grow in humility and vulnerability throughout your decades of life.

That's hard.

You would have allowed the humanity you created to strip you of all dignity and nail you to a cross as a living sacrifice to offer your sinless life blood for the sins of the entire world.

Of course, this is what Jesus will do, and that's hard.

Which is harder?

Well, any miracle worker can heal someone, but to make forgiveness possible, that's hard.

That requires the Saviour of the world to do the task he was given by the Father.

The shadow of the cross is casting its ominous destiny over the Son of God here for the first time in the Gospel of Mark, and Jesus is subtly communicating, I think, this truth to the jam-packed crowd in this little house.

Then Jesus says, But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.

So he said to the man, I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.

He got up, took his mat, and walked out in full view of them all.

This amazed everyone, and they praised God, saying, we have never seen anything like this.

The paralysed man received more than he sought.

Amen.

He was confronted with his greatest need, and it was fulfilled.

He was comforted with the gift and mystery of faith, and encountered by a real Saviour who does what is harder.

Who or what is your functional Saviour?

No one can deny Jesus reframed what the young man needed.

Nothing could be more obvious than the healing that was right there in his mind and heart and future and prayers, but Jesus taught the man that his relationship with God was even more pressing.

So we need to be right with God.

I don't know what your story is, where you're at.

Can I encourage you in Jesus' name to lean towards faith?

Lean towards faith, and you'll find a loving Saviour who will embrace you and in his mysterious way will make your heart come alive.

He says he promises he'll take away your stony heart and give you a heart of flesh and put his spirit inside of you to teach you to walk according to his statutes.

That's what he has promised.

And for those of us who do know Jesus as Saviour, we need to continue to learn what it means to have him as Lord.

Amen?

To learn to live the life of the redeemed.

To live with a functioning, functional, real life, everyday Saviour.

I think the scripture passage we're trying to memorise captures this idea so well.

We're thinking about it for prayer, but let me read it to you.

Rejoice in the Lord always, Paul writes.

I'll say it again.

Rejoice!

Let your gentleness be evident to all.

The Lord is near.

We have a functioning, functional Saviour, so experience the joy and don't be anxious about anything.

But in every situation, in the life that you now live, embrace that life by grace, by prayer and petition with thanksgiving.

Present your requests to God.

And it's going to change the way you live.

The peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

And over time, you won't need the functional Saviour that is an idol.

But Jesus will be enough.

Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things because the redeemed mind needs to be renewed daily to live in that peace that transcends all understanding.

To live in such a way that you are freed from the need to seek another functional Saviour.

Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, Paul writes, or seen in me, put it into practice.

I think we could add, in community, live the life we were called to live.

Learn how to do it.

And the God of peace will be with you because that's what Jesus always promised.

I'll never leave you or forsake you.

I'll be with you as you walk this journey of life.

In Jesus' name, may we not settle for less than life, even life to the full.

And that is all about knowing God through Jesus by the Spirit.

When Jesus was heading to the cross in John 17, he said, this is eternal life.

And we all listened, what is he going to say describing eternal life?

He said, this is eternal life.

And what is the answer?

This is what it's all about.

This is eternal life, that you may know God and Jesus Christ, His Son.

That's what we are moving towards, isn't it?

Salvation through faith in Christ, that we might know God.

And when we walk close with God, knowing Him, the with God life will protect us from the desires of our heart to create functional saviours.

Amen.

Lord Jesus, we thank You that You are the Saviour of the world.

And we do want to take a moment, I just wonder if we could take a moment to confess right now.

The ideas, the prayers, the goals that have become functional saviours.

If you imagine a box at the foot of the cross, just take it in your mind's eye and put it in there.

Abandon it!

Receive again the truth that you have a Saviour who is enough.

And out of that relationship, there will be many things that you will pray for and work towards.

‍