*sermon given 16/11/2014*
So I’m preaching on something called intercession today.
And I spent a little
while trying to think of a less complicated way of saying intersection.
So it’s
praying for your friends and its pointing them towards Jesus. It’s having our friend’s
backs when they're struggling as a Christian. Then I got it...
"Spiritual wingman / wing woman" that’s basically
all it is.
Who here has ever watched how I met your mother?
So for those of you who don't know there is a guy called Barney
and he is always trying to set the main character ted up with a date. And in an
effort to introduce ted to these girls Barney plays a game called "have
you met ted" where he constantly puts ted in the position where he is face
to face with this girl. Giving him the opportunity to ask for her number.
Now intersection is a bit like that in that our aim when we are praying for our friends is to
constantly put our friends in the position where they have the opportunity to find out about Jesus.
the thing is its very much in jesuses nature to answer "you do it" as in , ok you have a heart for your friend. go searv them . go be my hands and feet in this situation. take my love to them.
That might start small like a friend asking you what you did
over the weekend and you just mention in passing that you came to kingdom
overflow. Or if perhaps you’re closer to this person and they say "oh I’m
having a hard time right now” you ask if you could pray for them or invite them
to church.
The bible is full of some really great stories of
intersection but the one I have decided to talk about is one that I love
because I think it has four of the coolest spiritual wingmen in the bible. This
is a very famous biblical story in mark 2 1-12. It’s says this
2 A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the
people heard that he had come home. 2 They gathered in such large numbers that
there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to
them.3 some men came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them.
4 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. 5 When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed
man, “Son, your sins are forgiven.6 Now some teachers of the law were sitting
there, thinking to themselves, 7 “Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s
blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”8 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? 9 Which is easier: to say to this
paralyzed man, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, take your mat and
walk’? 10 But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to
forgive sins.” So he said to the man, 11 “I tell you, get up, take your mat and
go home.” 12 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!
Now think about how packed our church gets at Christmas and Easter
time. And this is a big building. Now imagine trying to fit that amount of
people in your house. Now think about if JESUS showed up at your house in
person just to hang out and preach the word. Could you imagine the complete
chaos of trying to fit everyone in. well that’s basically what’s going on here
when the four friends show up.
I don’t know if you have ever tried to carry a sleeping
toddler when they are so fast asleep that they just become like this dead
weight. Well when someone is paralysed they are that dead weight but adult
sized. So this wouldn't have been easy for these four guys. But what I think
would have been more exhausting was the weight of him spiritually on them. Have
you guys ever had to carry a friend through a tough time spiritually and emotionally?
It’s exhausting and emotionally draining. You know why that is, it’s because
guys we are just not designed to carry people spiritually the same way Jesus is,
we can’t bare the weight of their problems as well as our own.
Now I imagine these four guys saying to the paralysed man. We
are almost there. You’re going to meet Jesus. Then turning the corner into the
little street where Jesus was and seeing the massive crowd and being like
"you have GOT to be kidding me”. They have promised this friend that they
will take him to meet Jesus, they want to stick to that promise
So the four guys
immediately start looking for a way to get this guy to Jesus because not only
did they promise him but he is simply too heavy to carry any longer both
physically and spiritually. They are entirely focused on getting there friend in
front of Jesus and at this point failure is just not an option.
then one the guys has this pure genius plan to push through
this crowd get up onto the roof and dig a hole in this roof and lower him down
like some ninja in bank heist movies where there are motion sensor on the floor
like , what ? This is how desperate these guys are to get this guy to the foot
of Jesus. I don’t know about you guys but I think I’ve got some pretty
fantastic friends. I am ot sure they would commit vandalism for me though.
These poor guys get up on the roof with the paralyzed guy. Now
the thing that struck me was. They hadn't managed to get into the house so they
wouldn't have known what room Jesus was in. they had to lean in to the roof and
listen out for him. And I think that is the KEY point about intercession. Your
main job is to listen out for Jesus and when you hear his voice. Remove as much
of what’s between your friend and Jesus as possible. And that exactly what the
four friends did them here Jesus and start just ripping at this roof like crazy
people.
At this point in the story I would have loved to see Jesus’s
face as bits of mud and stuff started falling on his head. Because if stuff
started falling on my head right now and someone interrupted my sermon I would
first be super confused then I would find it kind of rude that they didn’t wait
until the ministry time to ask me for prayer
But nowhere in this story do we see Jesus get mad at these
guys and you know why I think that is. I think it’s kind of similar to what Jesus
dose for us he carries us to the father via the cross. Breaking down every
barrier between us and God. He rips the metaphorical roof in our life. The veil
which separated the holy place in the temple where Jews thought God was in the
temple. Literally ripped when Jesus died releasing us into Gods presence.
Now we get to my favourite bit. Can you imagine how awkward
the paralysed man is when he gets in front of Jesus like "hi, very sorry
to interrupt your sermon and this is extremely aqward. Sorry about the slight vandalism
but kind of need your help here Jesus"
The way Jesus
responds takes everyone by surprise especially the Pharisees. who were like the
religious big wigs of the time who were waiting for Jesus to trip up so they
could arrest him he doesn't start by saying "get up and walk" that’s
not jesses priority for the man. He sees the paralysed mans heart and realises
there is a much bigger problem spiritually for him to attend to
One thing I’ve noticed in my five years as a Christian is
that Jesus fixes things from the inside out. As a lot of you know I have
several health problems which god is either healing or teaching me to use for
his glory. But you know I never got healed from any health trouble until god
had come into my biggest problem which was my heart and my need to feel acceptance.
You see the biggest miracle Jesus will ever do is on the
inside. We as humans long to see our friend heal of all sorts of things but
sometimes Jesus has a bigger miracle to do than the one you where praying for. Im
sure you have had that feeling when you have prayed for someone and noting
happens and you feel that pulse of disappointment in the pit of your stomach.
That’s how I felt every time I prayed for my granddad for
the last six weeks of his life. But guys
I was praying for the wrong thing. I just wanted him to wake up and start
making sarcastic comments about the room service in hospitals. But that’s not
what Jesus decided to do. Jesus decided that on Tuesday the third of February
he was going to make himself SO evident in that place. I was reading the gospel
of Luke at my granddads bedside. He wakes up more than he has been awake in
months and says “don’t you worry about me. I’m going to be fine” I can’t
explain how I know this but I just knew that that was my granddad saying he had
found Jesus. Two days later on the fifth of February he went to meet him
So that’s why Jesus deals with what’s on the inside first. The
outside physical stuff is secondary.
Getting back to the bible passage. Like I was saying. The Pharisees
are looking for a way to make Jesus look like a criminal. And Jesus has just
given them a whole heap of ammunition by forgiving this guy’s sins that according
to them is not his job. i am Paraphrasing here but what they thought was something like
“oh no he dint just do that”. But they don’t want to cause a drama so they don’t
say anything. Jesus however is totally game. And knows what they are thinking. So
he leaves this paralysed guy laying there in the middle of a crowd all confused.
Side note: the four guys who brought the paralysed man are
still watching this through the hole in the roof probably with that same disappointed
feeling I just spoke about
He goes up to the Pharisees and in a much more eloquent Jesus
like fashion says “oh yes I did, watch me do it again”
Another side note: the four guys who had just about hit
breaking point and where probably trying to figure out how they were going to
get there friend back home look back at Jesus like Hu? What’s going on here?
So Jesus now appears back in the paralysed guy’s line of
vision and says “take up your matt and go”.
Bam its not until the point where Jesus has been working with this guy
so long that the four friends give up hope of ever seeing him healed do they
start to see the fruit of all the work they have put into getting there friend in
front of Jesus.
But that’s the thing about being a spiritual wingman or
woman we very really see anything for the work we put in. everyone’s walk with
god is so personal and so individual that we often don’t see even 5 % of what Jesus
is doing in someone’s life. The four people who chose to sacrifice their time and energy did finally get to see him healed
and do you know I would have loved to have seen their reaction when they got to
walk back home not carrying there friend but walking alongside him.
But having a heart for intersection will more often than not
hurt it will be exhausting and sometimes you’re not going to see a miracle like
the four guys in this story did. But I can assure you that Jesus sees you when
you have an authentic heart to see him breakthrough in your friend life and he
will honer that. It just might not always look the way you hoped it would.
