Our Sermons

Bible Passage: Mark 6:1-6
Pastor: Pastor Berg
Sermon Date: July 11, 2021

I’ve been a pastor now for nearly 17 years. I’ve been privileged to preach in Florida, Ohio, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, and Wisconsin. I’ve preached in front of congregations as few as 10 and I’ve presented to an arena filled with more than 2000. The point isn’t to toot my own horn, but just to give you an idea that I’ve had a wide range of experiences. I’m pretty comfortable talking in front of people. But there’s two places that would make me more nervous than any other to preach in. One is at the Seminary. And the other…Faith Ev. Lutheran in Fond du Lac. 

What’s so intimidating about those two places? I think you might be able to figure out what makes the Seminary intimidating. It’s the audience. It’s the professors who are tempted to see you as the student they remember who didn’t always do so well in class. It’s the classmates who know all too well your weaknesses and the skeletons in your closet. I think you can understand that. But what’s so intimidating about Faith Ev. Lutheran Church in Fond du Lac? That’s my home church. That’s the church where I grew up. 

That’s the place where people are tempted to see me as just that short little kid with the high pitched voice or the teenager that tended to take church softball too seriously. You get the picture, right? We often think of home as a place where we would always be welcome, always be appreciated, maybe even celebrated. But at least for pastors, truth be told, Contrary to Popular Belief: You Can’t Always Go Home.

Today, we see just such a stumbling block negatively impact the preaching ministry of Jesus. “Jesus left there and went to his hometown. His disciples followed him. When the Sabbath came, he began to teach in the synagogue. Many who heard him were amazed.” It all seemed to start out so well. Jesus goes home. He brings his friends with him. He goes to church, to the synagogue that he had grown up worshiping in his whole life. But this time, he’s the one doing the teaching. And at first glance, we might think it couldn’t have gone any better. “Many who heard him were amazed.” It was a mind-blowing moment for them. They couldn’t believe what they were hearing. And that’s the key word there. Believe. They couldn’t believe. They didn’t believe. Their questions betray their lack of faith. “They asked, “Where did this man learn these things? What is this wisdom that has been given to this man? How is it that miracles such as these are performed by his hand?” 

They should have been looking for someone just like Jesus. They knew their Old Testament. They knew the promise God made through Moses that a prophet like him would come from their own brothers who will have God’s Word in his mouth. Their logic should have told them exactly where the wisdom came from, how he was doing the miracles. They should have come to the same conclusion as Nicodemus in John chapter 3 when he said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God, for no one can do these miraculous signs you are doing unless God is with him.” Jesus’ deeds and words pointed to the obvious answer to their questions. But they didn’t get there. Why?

“Isn’t this the carpenter, the son of Mary and the brother of James, Joses, Judas, and Simon? And aren’t his sisters here with us?” They knew him. He’d grown up there. He was the carpenter. Nazareth was a small town with small town tendencies. Narrowness and prejudices and cliques and petty family pride were ripe in Nazareth. The old saying goes, “Familiarity breeds contempt.” For the people of Nazareth, the familiarity of the boy who once played in their streets and worshiped in their synagogues now had them looking down on him in contempt. “And they took offense at him.” Literally, they were tripped up by him. They couldn’t make sense of it all. They couldn’t get past their preconceived notions of him, which led Jesus to say, “A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and among his own relatives and in his own house.” 

Mark concludes this short section by saying, “He could not do any miracles there except to lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them. He was amazed at their unbelief. Then he went around the villages teaching.” The people of Nazareth had their minds blown that the hometown carpenter could be teaching and preaching and healing. But their amazement led to unbelief. This unbelief led to amazement for Jesus. Only two times in all of Scripture is Jesus said to be amazed. The first is Jesus’ amazement at the faith of the centurion, faith which logically shouldn’t have been there. A faith which against all odds the Holy Spirit had created. And the second time is here. Jesus is amazed at the unbelief that should never had been, the unbelief despite all of the evidence staring them in the face, the unbelief in spite of every seeming advantage.

What kind of amazement would Jesus show here? It’s easy to look at the people of Nazareth and say, “How could they?” They had Jesus right there in their midst and they were tripped up by their familiarity with him. But isn’t the same true here? Hasn’t familiarity with God’s Word in some ways led us to take it for granted? Hasn’t our familiarity with God’s Word led us to think we know it all already so we don’t need to hear it again? Hasn’t our familiarity with God’s Word led us to neglect it, even despise it because we may not like the guy who’s sharing it? May God forgive us for treating his Word with contempt! May we lay those sins at the feet of the cross and look to the Savior who bled and died for us, even as we have taken offense at him. 

The thing is, Jesus knew this would happen. God had foretold it. What do we read in Isaiah 53? “He grew up before him like a tender shoot and like a root from dry ground. He had no attractiveness and no majesty. When we saw him, nothing about his appearance made us desire him. He was despised and rejected by men…” Even his own family had the same problem as we’ve already seen. Yet none of this stopped Jesus from carrying out his mission. Even despite this rejection in his hometown, Jesus kept on teaching, kept on preaching. Jesus kept on fulfilling God’s plan of salvation for people who rarely said thank you or appreciated the many things he did. Working for people who despised and rejected him. Working for people who took him and his Word for granted. Working for the people of Nazareth and working for people like you and me. His love for us and his desire for us to be with him in heaven is what kept his face set toward the cross. 

And it’s because of what Jesus did in our place that allows God to look at us and be properly amazed. Amazed and smitten with his children who are wearing his own righteousness. Well pleased with those who strive to serve him. A Father with arms flung wide ready to receive his beloved. Preparing works for us to do that we might say a proper ‘thank you’ for all that he’s done for us. May our familiarity with Jesus and his Word not lead us to despise him, but to cherish him all the more!

The theme of the sermon is You Can’t Always Go Home Again. I didn’t realize this when I planned the series, but that title is actually a title of a book written by Thomas Wolfe. He indicates that if you try to remember a place from the past, when you go back you’ll be disappointed because so much has changed. Hence, you can’t go home again. But I don’t think he’s right, at least not when it comes to God and his Word and his house. While things certainly change in churches, one thing doesn’t change. The Word. The message of Jesus is unchanging. And even if you’ve been tripped up by it in the past, even if you’ve left it for a time, you can come home again. You can always come home to God’s free and faithful grace. Maybe you know someone who feels like they can’t come here, come home again. Assure them that they can! Assure them that Jesus loves them and wants them to come home! And so I’m changing my theme. Let them know that  Contrary to Popular Belief: You Can Always Come Home to God’s House Again! Amen.