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MARKed By Good News- Week 4
Pastor Andrew Schmidt continues a new sermon series called, “MARKed by Good News”. This is part of our MARKed: A Year in the Gospel of Mark. This week’s passage centers on MARK 1:21-28. Kodis Rawlings begins this sermon by reading the passage from Mark.
You can listen to the sermon below, or you can subscribe to our Celebrators Podcast wherever you listen.
Sermon Notes:
Mark 1:21-28
The first place Jesus goes with the disciples he just called to learn to fish for people, is the synagogue. This is like going to church to reach people far from God.
While teaching evil manifests as an impure spirit speaks through a man it possesses. (vs. 23-24).
The question it asks “What do you want with us?” is likely referring to the other evil spirits in the region. However, there also could be a sense that it is speaking what is in the hearts of many of those who are present.
When Jesus, who is Lord, proclaims the good news of God’s kingdom he says “Repent and believe” (1:15) which means “change” to align with God’s ways you can trust me. When Jesus asks us to change we too, often, internally respond with resistance “What do you want with us?”
But our choice is to align with Jesus or to align with evil. Evil is at work in our lives seeking to influence and control us. In order to respond well to Jesus in the midst of this evil two helpful things to remember:
Jesus has authority and we have authority in his name (Ephesians 1:20-23; 2:6). Like a police officer directing traffic in New York city. Drivers have power to flatten the officer with the vehicles they are in and don’t necessarily want to listen, yet they obey the officer’s signal. This is because the officer has the authority of New York City behind them due to her position. We have authority in the name of Jesus over evil.
Second, we are to resist evil by trusting in, submitting to, and relying on God (James 4:7-8, 1 Peter 5:8-9, Ephesians 6:10-20)
Resources:
Lectio Davina Approach to Scripture PDF
Free Online Bible: BibleGateway
Free SmartPhone Bible App: YouVersion