Mark Rogers

Archive for September, 2009

Having been a Christian for over 27 years, I’ve heard a lot of sermons. And because there are certain passages of scripture that lend themselves to good public speaking subjects, some of those sermons I’ve heard over and over in different forms. One such passage is Mark 6:31-44. If you’ve been in church any time at all, you’ve heard sermons on the “loaves and fishes” till you’ve had to purge your mind to get any more sermons in. And it is a great message of God’s supernatural provision. But there is a point made by Jesus that is rather obvious, extremely important, but largely unnoticed. How do I know it’s unnoticed? Because I have never once heard it preached about in my 27 years as a Christian.

The passage starts out by Jesus telling his inner circle of 12 to “Come away by yourselves to a secluded place and rest a while.” There were so many people coming endlessly to Him and the 12, that He recognized they needed some rest. And if Jesus called a halt to the ministry to call for some rest for his friends and Himself, they must have seriously needed it. So he commanded that they go to a secluded or “quiet” place to get away from the crowds. Problem with this plan was that somehow the word got out where they were headed and when they got to their “secluded spot” five thousand men, along with women and children showed up. Possibly 20,000 or more people were waiting on him when they go to the place that Jesus took them to in order to rest. So, what did He do. Did He say “whoops, duck down and let’s get out of here before they see us”? After all He knew they really needed rest. But that’s not what happened. To what was no doubt a horrible realization to the guys who thought they were going to have some down time, the Bible says that Jesus “had compassion” on the crowd. And the Bible says in verse 34 that He “began to teach them many things”. So, instead of eating, drinking, having a litte them time, the 12 found themselves in a position of service to the crowd.

And Jesus preached for a long time – vs. 35 “When it was already quite late”…… So long that the 12 got together and schemed a way to get rid of the crowd, not doubt so they could get the rest they had come there for. So they said to Jesus, in vs. 36, “send them away so that they may go into the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat.” They asked Jesus to send those poor hungry people off to McDonalds to get something to eat before they faint. After all it’s for their own good.

The words that came from Jesus next must have been the most terrible thing the already exhausted 12 could have heard. He looked at the ones He had brought here many hours ago to “rest” and said to them, in verse 37, “You give them something to eat!” And there were thousands to serve. They immediately sought relief by what was obvious when they said, “Shall we go and spend two hundred denarii on bread and give them something to eat?” In other words, “we don’t have anything to give them, and it would take a fortune we don’t have to go buy it”. This was no doubt thinking that this would put an end to this ridiculous idea, and get rid of all these people so the 12 could finally rest and eat. But since we’ve all heard this next part of the story, we know that Jesus knew they had plenty in the loaves and fishes of a nearby boy.

So, He had them sit down in groups on the grass and had the 12 serve what may have been over 20,000 people. This all without them having had any rest. And to top it all off, he made them take up the leftovers!

Here is the monstrous point made by Mark 6 that goes unnoticed in the shadow of the provisional story of the loaves and fishes. Jesus loved the 12 and brought them here to rest. He knew they needed it. He knew it was important. But the bottom line is, they had all committed to follow Him. And something happened when they got there and Jesus saw the crowd. He put His own needs…..and theirs on the back burner and turned His attention….and theirs, to the needs of the people. Something He did 100% of the time. And when He put His own needs aside, He expected the ones committed to following Him to do the same. These principles would be echoed by the Apostle Paul decades later when he penned the words of Phillipians 2:3-5 “…regard one another as more important than yourselves;…Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus,”…
and he goes on to point out Christ’s emptying of Himself and eventual death for us.

This stands in stark contrast to people who only serve God under their own conditions, only when it’s convenient, and only for a limited time. And those who refuse to serve at all, having the nerve to quote scriptures, claim to hear from God and say lofty things…..only to trade scriptures for excuses when asked to serve. No, if we have committed to follow Christ, His intent is for us to follow in His footsteps, putting aside our own plans and needs in deference to those who need us. In light of what Jesus did and Paul wrote, “I’m too tired” or “I’m too busy” are lame terms that put us squarely in the category of ignoring and rejecting God’s demand for our service.

And that is the larger, and sadly missing issue of Mark 6.

Leaders are an interesting lot. They often tell others to do things they cannot or do not intend to do when it comes to exhorting the saints to care for one another. I don’t know how many times in my Christian life I have looked at a group of people and told them to both care for one another and to accept care when they need it. I, along with my wife, have often either directly, or through organizing others, provided life giving and sometimes life saving help for other people. And I’ve had the privilege and joy of watching the effect that Biblical care for one another has on the recipient when they are lifted, by other believers, from a place of devastation back to a place of strength, health and spiritual productivity. But as far as receiving that same care….well….that’s another matter.

After all, we’re leaders. We should be the pillars of strength and stability that our onlookers and admirers expect us to be….right? Aren’t we supposed to be able to stand on our own two feet, suck it up, brace up, take the bull by the horns, kick the devil in the teeth……you know…all that stuff? Not according to scripture. According to scripture, the whole body should have the same care for one another. There is no exception for position or authority. It is assumed by scripture that everybody will need help and have to depend on other believers for assistance from time to time.

So, this is my confession and news of my newest revelation. I’ve always felt comfortable asking people to help me with ministry tasks, asking for minor favors, a ride when my car is being repaired. You know, minor, quick favors. And I always looked at that as my part in receiving the benefits of Galatians 6:2 “Bear one another’s burdens, and thereby fulfill the law of Christ.” But without realizing it, even though we have endlessly involved ourselves in other peoples’ lives and have been thrilled and privileged to do it, I never have really been willing to “bother” anybody with anything serious or time consuming. Until now.

In January of 2009, my mother in law, Pat Mathis, ceased taking chemotherapy that had been keeping cancer at bay for the previous four and a half years. For her, she had come to a place where to “depart and be with Christ is far better”. And she set out on a journey to let the cards fall where they may. And in the absence of a book of Acts miracle, she was headed headlong for eternity. This act set our family on a journey we had never imagined, that would produce a domino effect on us all for nearly nine months.

As Pat became weaker and weaker, she began to need more and more help from her daughters until finally she was needing round the clock care. This started around May and lasted until her death in September. My wife and her sisters began to rotate taking care of Pat at her home. When she had physical bouts that landed her in the hospital, it would take two of them because my father in law was (is) in very poor health and could not stay by himself. This put me in the position of becoming mom and dad to our teenage daughter and taking up all the slack that an absent parent and life partner leaves when they are absent. And as the disease in Pat’s body progressed, my wife’s absences became longer and longer becoming three to five days weekly, and sometimes more during a hospital bout.

Finally, at the end of August, my mother in law went into hospice care at Saint Edwards hospital and this is where she would pass from this life ….nineteen days after she entered. And during that time, my wife and her sisters lived there full time only coming home to shower and get a few supplies. On Friday afternoon, September 18th Pat Mathis’s journey in this life ended as she stepped quietly into heaven.

During this five and a half month ordeal, from May to August, my wife and I were forced into a place of humility that we had not ever experienced before. We found ourselves depending on other people to keep us propped up instead of us being the strength for others. As people began to ask what we needed we began to reluctantly ask them for help. As more and more people came forward with offers to cook, clean, drive, help…..in a hundred ways, they came seeing our multiple dilemmas and one by one taking care of our difficulties and taking care of us. We found ourselves….dependent.

We needed rides for our daughter. We needed food cooked and delivered to our family. On a Wednesday church night in a driving rain with a flat tire and wheel that was seared to the lugs, five men stood out in the church parking lot in the rain and worked on getting that wheel off and getting the spare on to make sure I got going. That’s the first time in my adult life I’ve ever stood by and let other people change a tire for me. Help came from every direction and we took it….had to take it. And there were those close friends who just simply were there all the time, knew instinctively what we needed, knew just what to say and when to say it. We found ourselves in tears more often than not. Not because of my mother in law, but because of the overwhelming reality of what God was providing through the multitude of people who showed up and never relented until we were through it.

Between the time Pat passed away and the end of the funeral four days later, a never ending supply of delicious food was delivered to our family, and not one thing that we needed done, other than funeral arrangements, had to be done by us. At the end of it all, we stood speechless with a lot of repair now needed for our lives, but under the full realization that we will never be the same, changed forever by the stunning illustration of what it means for the members of the body of Christ to care for one another. And because of this experience, while we will continue to serve God and do whatever we can to bring strength to others, I don’t expect we will ever again exclude ourselves from the care of the body of believers who held our hands up and our lives together for five and a half months.

Because when it comes to the body of Christ, we should always embrace dependence.