Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Sermon Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/Sermons/zz20101121.htm

BIOGRAPHIES OF BIBLE SAINTS
III. Mary and Martha: Overcoming Sinful Weaknesses Through Christ
C. The Triumph Over Sinful Weakness In Rightly Handling Scripture (John 12:1-11)
    Introduction: (To show the need . . . )

    A big temptation exists for Bible-believing Christians to yield to pressure from the ungodly to shift our focus from indisputable Bible passages to disputable ones, with the ungodly implying interpretations to the disputable passages that seduce us into abandoning true beliefs.

    For example, in our last message, we learned how Genesis 9:6 KJV indisputably institutes capital punishment in stating: "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man." However, after I gave that message, believers present in the service asked me questions that had been raised to them that originate from foes of the death penalty, questions based on other disputable Bible passages (as follows): (1) "How can God favor the death penalty if He did not call for Cain's death when he murdered his brother Abel?" (2) "Did not Jesus in John 7:53-8:11 counter the death penalty in refusing to judge the woman caught in the act of adultery?"

    (3) Then, while on vacation, I learned the American Humanist Association is running a nationwide ad campaign using Bible verses to get readers to counter "Fundamentalist Religion." (Earthtimes.org, "Humanists Launch Largest National Advertising Campaign Critical of Fundamentalist Religion," 2010-11-09) One provocative ad reads as follows: "The Bible: The people of Samaria must bear their guilt, because they have rebelled against their God. They will fall by the sword; their little ones will be dashed to the ground, their pregnant women ripped open.' God, Hosea 13:16 (New International Version) Humanism: I cannot imagine a God who rewards and punishes the objects of his creation, whose purposes are modeled after our own? a God, in short, who is but a reflection of human frailty.' Albert Einstein, column for The New York Times, Nov. 9, 1930"

    Thus, as in the case of this last example, it is tempting for us to yield to the pressure of the ad's debatable rendering of Hosea 13:16, one suggesting the Bible's God as a brutal, evil slayer of vulnerable, innocent and unborn infants, that we end up rejecting the death penalty regardless if Genesis 9:6 clearly calls for it, or that we even reject the whole Christian faith in belief that the Bible's God is brutally evil!

    We will answer each issue above in defense of the Bible's holy God and His righteousness in our conclusion, but, to prepare for the sermon, we ask, "How may I properly handle the Bible to be discipled versus being seduced into error by the ungodly?"

    Need: "How may I properly handle Scripture to be discipled versus adopting persuasive but errant views of Scripture by the ungodly?!"

  1. A HUGE CONTRAST in the DEGREE of VICTORY over SIN and ERROR existed in the people presented in John 12:1-11:
    1. In great victory over sinful weakness and error are Martha and Mary:
      1. John 12:1-2a reveals Martha was hostess at a meal held in honor of Jesus for raising her brother, Lazarus, from the dead. NO critique arose this time from Martha for Mary's not helping her, a mark of victory for Martha over her failure in the Luke 10:38-42 incident!
      2. John 12:3 reveals Mary anointed Jesus' feet with costly perfume, and Matthew 26:6-7, 12-13 shows she did it in awareness of Jesus' coming death and burial. This shows Mary had learned of Christ's death, so, to her honor, history knows her as the only person in Jesus' day to realize He would die and rise again before the events occurred! (Ryrie Study Bible, KJV, 1978, ftn. to Matthew 26:12)
    2. However, Jesus' disciples followed Judas Iscariot in wrongly chiding Mary for using the perfume to anoint Jesus versus selling it for a lot of money and giving it to the poor, Matthew 26:8 with John 12:4-5.
    3. Worse, Judas Iscariot's critique of Mary arose out of greed for some of the value in the perfume: he was the group treasurer, and would steal some of the money, so his critique was an evil one, John 12:4-6.
    4. Even more wicked, Israel's religious leaders planned both to kill Jesus for raising Lazarus (John 11:45-53) and to slay Lazarus in an effort to remove the reason for people even to trust in Christ, John 12:9-11!
  2. The REASON these people CONTRASTED in their RESPONSE to Jesus' raising of Lazarus is based on how FAR each SUBMITTED to CLEAR SCRIPTURE TEACHING on that event:
    1. All Israel knew Isaiah 35:4-6 and 61:1 predicted Messiah's Kingdom would be marked by such works as the healing of the blind, the lame, the lepers and the deaf, and by raising the dead and the preaching of the gospel to the poor. This is evident in Matthew 11:2-6 when Jesus mentioned these works to show John's disciples He was the Messiah.
    2. When Mary and Martha saw Jesus raise Lazarus in fulfillment of such prophecies, they fully accepted His Messiahship as seen in their acts:
      1. Martha submitted to Jesus' clear fulfillment of such Scriptures and served the meal held in His honor without Mary's aid! (John 12:2a)
      2. Mary realized that Jesus' raising of Lazarus showed not only that He was the Messiah, but that prophecies of Christ's own death for sin were to be taken just as LITERALLY as Jesus' testimony that He was the Resurrection, producing great awe for Jesus in Mary:
        1. Based on Jesus' raising of Lazarus from the dead as the true Messiah in fulfillment of Jesus' claim to be the Resurrection and the Life (John 11:25-26, 43-44), Mary could see that John's prophecy that He was God's Lamb Who would take away the sin of the world meant He would LITERALLY die as a sin offering for the world, John 1:29. Yet, Isaiah 53:10 taught God would prolong that Sin Offering's days, so Mary could see Jesus would LITERALLY rise as the Resurrection and the Life!
        2. Mary could also read in Isaiah 53:11 that by acknowledging this Messiah (by faith), individuals in the world would be justified by God, and so cleanse nations of people from sin (Isa. 52:15a).
      3. Thus, Mary reacted to such great truths with the greatest act she could do: she anointed Jesus' feet with costly perfume and wiped them with her hair in pure worship, John 12:3, 7; Matt hew 26:13!
    3. Yet, the response of the others involved revealed varying degrees of spiritual defeat by their varying failures to heed such clear Scripture:
      1. Though Jesus' disciples believed He was God's messenger, they had not realized by Lazarus' resurrection the implication that Mary saw, that the prophecies of Jesus' death and resurrection were to be taken as literally as His fulfillment of Isaiah 35:4-6 and 61:1. Thus, they followed Judas in critiquing Mary, and chided her for using her perfume to anoint Jesus' feet, Matt. 26:8; John 12:4-5.
      2. Judas not only ignored Jesus' fulfillment of Isaiah 35:4-6 and 61:1 in raising Lazarus, but he focused only on the earthly value of the perfume and scolded Mary's "waste" of it, John 12:4-5; 6:70-71!
      3. Israel's leaders both ignored Jesus' fulfillment of Isaiah 35:4-6 and 61:1 in raising Lazarus and also wickedly planned to kill Lazarus, the Biblical evidence of Jesus' messiahship, to keep others from trusting in Christ in their effort to sustain a following in Israel and preserve their role as rulers in Israel, John 12:9-11!
Application: (1) May we trust in Christ as Savior to receive eternal life, John 3:16. (2) May we SUBMIT to CLEAR SCRIPTURE TEACHING for GUIDANCE for MORE discipleship in the REST of Scripture, ESPECIALLY in its DISPUTABLE passages!

Conclusion: (To illustrate the message . . . )

 To answer the issues in our introduction, we follow Mary and Martha's lead to adopt Scripture's indisputable claims (Genesis 9:6 in our case), and use it to guide us to understand the debatable ones:

(1) Regarding God's failure to call for Cain's death for slaying his brother Abel, Genesis 9:6 states capital punishment is for violating God's image, not for human revenge, a sin, Romans 12:19! God inhibited such human revenge against Cain (Gen. 4:14-15) and called for the death penalty only after the Flood when no one alive had killed anyone! The death penalty is not for man's revenge, but to exalt God!

(2) Regarding Jesus' refusal to condemn the woman caught in adultery, manuscript evidence shows the whole John 7:53-8:11 account was likely not in John's original Gospel (B. K. C., N. T. , p. 346). Yet, even if it were true, Jesus there supported the death penalty, inviting the innocent to throw the first stone, John 8:7! When all her foes left, Jesus could not legally punish the woman because no witness was present, Deut. 17:6-7! This passage does not oppose the death penalty!

(3) Regarding the humanist ad on Hosea 13:16 about atrocities performed against Israel in judgment and a citation from Alfred Einstein countering belief in a punitive God, Hosea 13:16 predicts the atrocities would be done by evil men, atrocities God Himself censures in Genesis 9:6, a truth verified by the testimony of 2 Kings 8:10-12. Israel's rejection of God left her without His shelter from evil men in line with Deuteronomy 28, leading to these atrocities, Matthew 23:37.

Also, what none of their ads will tell ever you, many humanists support atrocities like abortion on demand, starving handicapped newborns to death and killing the elderly who are considered no longer "productive" to society to align with the "survival of the fittest" idea in Charles Darwin's theory of evolution! (apologetics.org, Caleb Colley, "Secular humanism and the Value of Human Life," citing J. I. Packer and Thomas Howard, Christianity: The True Humanism , 1985, p. 141). Such humanists are the least qualified of all to pontificate on the moral issues related to the death penalty or the character of Scripture's God!

So, to gain victory over sin and error, may we like Mary and Martha SUBMIT to Scripture's CLEAR passages, using them to GUIDE us to interpret less clear passages so we can avoid the wiles of persuasive, ungodly parties, and so mature in Christ!