Sermon Tone Analysis

Just too Ordinary

Mark 6:1–13 (ESV)

Introduction

Jesus left Capernaum and travelled southward into the hill country until he came to the village where he had spent his youth and the early years of his maturity.

Jesus returned to Nazareth as would a rabbi, accompanied by his disciples.

Our Lord returns to this little small town for one final visit to the people who were most familiar with Him.

After all if you grow up for 30 years in a town of 500, you know everybody and everybody knows you.

About a year earlier, He had made that other visit when they tried to kill Him.

He suffered intense rejection in his hometown of Nazareth.

It started out well enough when, alone on the Sabbath, he stood in his family’s synagogue and read verses 1 and 2 of chapter 61 of the Isaiah scroll and “all spoke well of him” (Luke 4:22).

But then he began to preach confrontationally, and the mood so violently changed that

“They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him down the cliff” (v.

29).

The loving municipality of Nazareth tried to kill their homegrown boy just as he began his ministerial career.

That is rejection![1]

Recently Jesus had undergone further personal humiliation when his own family had attempted to lure him into a place where they could privately restrain him and take him back to Nazareth because they believed, “He is out of his mind” (3:21, 31–34).[2]

Now Mark records another attempt on Jesus’ part to reach out to the people of his hometown.

It appears, humanly speaking, that his recent miracles in calming the storm, liberating the demoniac, healing the woman, and raising Jairus’ daughter had given rise to the personal hope that his hometown and family would be softened to his claims and receive his ministry.

So Jesus planned another trip north to Nazareth in an attempt to reach his people, and thus we have the story before us.

In this text we witness the Lord

reaching out to an unbelieving people,

what happened to him in return,

and how he and his disciples responded.

There is considerable wisdom here for how a Christian lives in an unbelieving world.[3]

Jesus is Offensive (vv.

1–6)

Mark 6:1–6 (ESV)

1 He went away from there and came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him.

2 And on the Sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished, saying, “Where did this man get these things?

What is the wisdom given to him?

How are such mighty works done by his hands? 3 Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon?

And are not his sisters here with us?”

And they took offense at him.

4 And Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his hometown and among his relatives and in his own household.”

5 And he could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them.

6 And he marveled because of their unbelief.

And he went about among the villages teaching.

Their initial reaction was amazement.

They were amazed at two things: his “wisdom” and his “miracles.”

The words and the miracles of Jesus prompted questions concerning the source of his doctrine and wisdom and of the power which had been exhibited elsewhere=in miracles of healing and exorcism.

It is possible that the people entertained the dark suspicions voiced earlier by the Jerusalem scribes (Ch.

3:22).

Jesus had not been schooled in rabbinic fashion but had been trained as a manual laborer.

His immediate family were well known to the villagers, who judged that there was nothing extraordinary about them that would have led them to expect something unusual from Jesus.

What was the source of his wisdom, and who had empowered him to speak and act with such authority?

To these questions two answers lie close at hand:

the source was God,

or it was demonic.

Their first impressions of astonishment shaded off to resentment when they recalled Jesus’ earlier vocation and standing in Nazareth.

Not knowing the source of his wisdom, they find his office as a teacher offensive.

In spite of what they heard and saw they failed to penetrate the veil of ordinariness which characterized this one who had grown up in the village.[4]

“Is not this the carpenter?”

means, Is he not a common worker with his hands even as the rest of us are?

The additional phrase “the son of Mary” is probably disparaging.

It was contrary to Jewish usage to describe a man as the son of his mother, even when she was a widow, except in insulting terms.

Rumors to the effect that Jesus was illegitimate appear to have circulated in his own lifetime and may lie behind this reference as well.[5]

What they cannot ascertain is where one so familiar to them could get all this power.

they apply human reasoning and they can’t figure him out

And Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his hometown and among his relatives and in his own household.

Their preoccupation with this issue means that they never get around to asking the crucial question:

What does it all mean?

The answer to that question will ultimately lead them to the answer of its source (see 3:27).

They are not driven so much by a desire to know what is behind Jesus’ miracles as by an itch to confirm their private prejudice that he cannot be all that remarkable.[6]

This jealous, rung-dropping attitude toward Jesus by his hometown was simply “part of humanity’s contempt for itself.”

As a result of their contempt,

“they took offense at him”

Knowing his claims, they were faced with the great trilemma of C. S. Lewis: he was either the Lord, a lunatic, or a liar.

They chose liar and a demonized one at that.[7] because he doesn’t fit in our paradigm

If Jesus is the Son of God from heaven, risen from the dead … If he’s from outside the world, he’s going to offend you in some way because he’s from outside the world.

and therefore every single place in the world, every mindset, every culture, at some point, will be offended by him.

You inhabit some part of that world.

So if he really is from outside, of course he would offend you.

If you’re sitting around saying, “Well, I accept Jesus as long as … I wish he didn’t say this,” or “I wish the Bible didn’t say this,” or “I wish Christians were like this, because that offends me …” If he’s real, he will have to offend you someplace.

So here’s the question.

Is Jesus Christ the Son of God risen from the dead?

If he is real, of course he would offend you in some way.

Either he is the Son of God risen from the dead and you have to take him with his offensiveness, or he’s not, and so who cares?[8]

The people from Nazareth want “an altogether glorious, supernatural Jesus whose credentials will be obvious to all, and refuse to believe that God discloses himself in the humanity of this one who is a member of a humble family and whose way, according to Mark’s testimony is the way of the cross.

“And he could do no mighty work there”

In the presence of gross unbelief Jesus restricted his activity to the healing of a few sick individuals.

Jesus was not free to exercise his power in these circumstances.

Unbelief excluded the people of Nazareth from the dynamic disclosure of God’s grace that others had experienced.[9]

The people of Nazareth already knew of Jesus’ miracles (6:2) but refused to believe.

Doubt has trouble believing; unbelief obstinately refuses to believe.

Most likely this is divine judgment: they reject Jesus, so God rejects them.

God will not work where he is not wanted.

I

n fact, Jesus will give the disciples the same principle when he tells them to “shake the dust off [their] feet” when people refuse to respond to the gospel (see 6:11 below; cf.

Matt.

7:6).

The unbelief of the people in this sense led to a restriction (“was not able to”) on Jesus’s miraculous power; nevertheless, the mercy and grace of God did lead to a few healings by Jesus here in Nazareth.[11]

“And he was amazed at their lack of faith.”

Jesus “amazed” at them, certainly conveying his very human shock at the extent of the rejection and “unbelief” of his former friends and neighbors.

their offense at Jesus keeps them from seeing him for who he is

Amazement frames this episode.

As Robert Stein says,

this foreshadows “the dark cloud descending upon the Son of God, which will eventually lead to the cross.[12]

Unbelief robs the Church of its power.

without a believing expectancy in Christ and his power, nothing will come of it.

Hebrews 11:6 (ESV)

6 And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.

If we want to please God, to know his pleasure and power, we must believe that the God revealed in the Old and New Testaments exists and that he acts equitably in behalf of his children.

Do you believe this?

The disciples, which now included the Twelve, sat transfixed in Nazareth’s synagogue.