SPECIAL DAYS: April 13, Passion/Palm Sunday

Lessons: Isaiah 50.4-9a; Mark 14.1-15

Sermon Title: Playing God

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INTRODUCTION:

A kindergarten teacher was observing her classroom of children while they drew. She would occasionally walk around to see each child''s artwork.

As she got to one little girl who was working diligently, she asked what the drawing was.

The girl replied, ""I''m drawing God.""

The teacher paused and said, ""But no one knows what God looks like.""

Without missing a beat, or looking up from her drawing, the girl replied, ""They will in a minute.""

  1. Hopefully at the end of this sermon we will know what Jesus looked like.

    1. We will also have time to look at the characters in today's episode of General Hospital, As the World Turns, The Bold and the Beautiful, or All My Children.

    2. A better title comes from an old movie starring Clint Eastwood called, The Good, the Bad, the Ugly.

    3. We know that we are not taking about a physical appearance, but about a spiritual reality.

William Shakespeare has Jacques in As You Like It, Act 2. Scene 7, saying:

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts...

  1. All the worlds a stage.

    1. Who wrote this script?

    2. I don't think that I particularly like this scenario.

    3. But then we write the script for our lives and the interactions with others and the world of which we are a part.

    4. Sometimes people are like the construction worker complaining about his lunch.

      1. Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches.

      2. Every day it was the same.

      3. One of his co-workers said, "Why don't you have your wife make something different."

      4. "My wife," he said, "I don't have a wife. I make my own lunch."

    5. We write our own scripts with our own words and actions.

  2. Let's produce a play

    1. Let's reduce the stage to a room in a home in Bethany

    2. We are not the director, we are only the critic, in the finest sense of the word.

      1. One who forms and expresses judgments of the merits, faults, value, or truth of a matter.

      2. One who specializes especially professionally in the evaluation and appreciation of literary or artistic works: a film critic; a dance critic.

      3. One who tends to make harsh or carping judgments; a faultfinder.

    3. Which one are we, let's see, we pick number 2?

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MAIN BODY:

  1. Now we need to set the stage and bring in the players.

    1. Just before the Triumphal entry into Jerusalem.

    2. What type of play are we creating?

      1. Greek Tragedy

      2. Shakespearian Tragedy

      3. Modern Tragedy

      4. Low Comedy (Slapstick)

      5. Farce

      6. High Comedy/Satire

      7. Light Comedy (Situational)

      8. Serious or Social Drama

      9. Melodrama

  2. Now we need some characters for the play, who shall we bring on.

    1. Our cast is set, we only need to introduce them.

      1. Mary, one of the Mary's, honestly we don't know which one.

      2. Simon who is a Pharisee

      3. Judas Iscariot, one of the Twelve

      4. Disciples, the remaining Eleven

      5. Guests, Lazarus, Mary and Martha and unknown and unnamed guests although they were friends of Simon and Lazarus.

      6. Jesus

    2. What do you know about them?

      1. One is perhaps a broken and battered woman who was rescued by Jesus.

        1. Mary Magdalene out of whom Jesus removed seven devils.

        2. The woman who was taken in adultery.

      2. One is a Pharisee.

They were extremely accurate and minute in all matters appertaining to the law of Moses (Matt. 9:14; 23:15; Luke 11:39; 18:12). Paul, when brought before the council of Jerusalem, professed himself a Pharisee (Acts 23:6-8; 26:4, 5). There was much that was sound in their creed, yet their system of religion was a form and nothing more. Theirs was a very lax morality (Matt. 5:20; 15:4, 8; 23:3, 14, 23, 25; John 8:7). On the first notice of them in the New Testament (Matt. 3:7), they are ranked by our Lord with the Sadducees as a "generation of vipers." They were noted for their self-righteousness and their pride (Matt. 9:11; Luke 7:39; 18:11, 12). They were frequently rebuked by our Lord (Matt. 12:39; 16:1-4). From the very beginning of his ministry the Pharisees showed themselves bitter and persistent enemies of our Lord. They could not bear his doctrines, and they sought by every means to destroy his influence among the people.

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      1. One may be a Zealot.

He, by his own choice, betrayed God's Son into the hands of soldiers (Luke 22:48). He was a thief (John 12:6). In betraying Jesus, Judas made the greatest mistake in history. Judas didn't lose his relationship with Jesus; rather, he never found Jesus in the first place.

      1. The disciples are a bit confused and addle-headed, not quite understanding what is going on.

      2. Lazarus was raised from the dead and is now a target of a plot to deaden him again.

      3. Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God

  1. Now let's get to the action and observe what is taking place.

    1. We break down the information what we have and this is what is taking place.

      1. 1It was two days before the Passover and the festival of Unleavened Bread.

      2. The chief priests and the scribes were looking for a way to arrest Jesus by stealth and kill him; 2for they said, "Not during the festival, or there may be a riot among the people."

      3. 3While he was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he sat at the table, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very costly ointment of nard, and she broke open the jar and poured the ointment on his head.

      4. 4But some were there who said to one another in anger, "Why was the ointment wasted in this way?

        1. 5For this ointment could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii, and the money given to the poor."

        2. And they scolded her.

      5. 6But Jesus said, "Let her alone; why do you trouble her?

        1. She has performed a good service for me.

        2. 7For you always have the poor with you, and you can show kindness to them whenever you wish; but you will not always have me.

        3. 8She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for its burial.

        4. 9Truly I tell you, wherever the good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her."

      6. 10Then Judas Iscariot, who was one of the twelve, went to the chief priests in order to betray him to them.

        1. 11When they heard it, they were greatly pleased, and promised to give him money.

        2. So he began to look for an opportunity to betray him.

      7. 12On the first day of Unleavened Bread, when the Passover lamb is sacrificed,...

        1. his disciples said to him, "Where do you want us to go and make the preparations for you to eat the Passover?"

        2. 13So he sent two of his disciples, saying to them, "Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you; follow him, 14and wherever he enters, say to the owner of the house, 'The Teacher asks, Where is my guest room where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?' 15He will show you a large room upstairs, furnished and ready. Make preparations for us there," (Mark 14:1-15, NRSVA).

  2. Who is playing God and why.

    1. Mary is acting for God.

      1. She did a great thing.

      2. The action that she performs is not only highly emotional for all, but it does the burial preparation that will not get done.

    2. Simon is playing God.

      1. He is acting a god from his point of view, the view of a Pharisee

      2. What Mary did was unnecessary.

      3. It violated the understanding of the law as Simon understood it.

    3. Judas is playing God.

      1. It is possible that he was trying to force Jesus' hand.

      2. Would Jesus or would Jesus not rebel against Rome and set up a new political government?

    4. Jesus is God in the flesh.

      1. He is the only one who is truly playing God, but not playing, being God.

  3. What is the outcome of this work of art?

    1. Mary is remembered

    2. Simon learns a lesson in compassion.

    3. Judas Iscariot betrays Jesus and takes his own life.

    4. The disciples muddle through and finally "get it."

    5. The guests are divided and some accept, others reject.

    6. Jesus dies, but that is not the end of the story.

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CONCLUSION

  1. What do we learn from this vignette?

  2. No matter what the outcome we can have confidence in the ultimate author of life.

A father and his young daughter were driving down a deserted country road late one afternoon when his little girl asked to steer the car. (1)

There wasn't any other traffic, so the father agreed-and, seconds later, the little girl was on her daddy's lap-her little hands grasped tightly around her daddy's big hands.

They drove along for a while enjoying the sites, trying to keep the car straight-until suddenly the little girl said, "Daddy, we've got to stop now. The road is coming to an end."

The surprised father looked up and said, "No, honey, the road isn't coming to an end. That's just a curve. Trust me. I've been this way before."

Can we feel Jesus saying that to us, "Trust me. I've been this way before"?

  1. What do we learn from this vignette?

    1. Does this help us to know what Jesus looks like?

    2. What about ourselves?

1. Cam Keyser, Charlotte, NC

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