MARK 2:1-22
Read Mark 2:1-22
Mark now gives us a series of stories that show Jesus at work in his ministry of healing and forgiveness, but, as he does so, starting to face opposition. And this opposition principally came from the religious authorities who, you would think, would be pleased to see the long-awaiting Son of God among them.
In the first instance we see that Jesus healed a paralysed man. Jesus’ reputation had gone before him as there was a great crowd there to witness the event. Jesus healed the man, miracle enough, but he also said to paralysed man, ‘your sins are forgiven’. It was not the healing that upset the religious people but Jesus saying that he forgave the man’s sins. And the reason for this is that it is only God who can forgive sin (Is 43:24, Micah 7:18). So, in their eyes Jesus was putting himself on the same footing as God himself, which of course is blasphemy – except for the fact that Jesus is God the Son. We know that because Mark made it clear at the beginning of his Gospel, but as far as the religious authorities were concerned this was someone claiming to have the authority of God and to them that was a real no no! As we progress through Mark’s Gospel we will meet many people who do not realise exactly who Jesus is.
Next, we see the calling of another of the disciples. This time it is Levi, who, just like those in Chapter 1, as soon as he received the call from Jesus, followed him. This was a very public calling. We are told that a large crowd came to Jesus and that is when he called Levi. The surprising thing is that Levi was a tax-collector and therefore hated by most in society. Tax collectors are not popular these days but in 1st Century Judea it was much worse. For one thing the tax collectors worked for the occupying forces, the Romans. Secondly, they were given a target to raise and hand over and anything extra they could keep for themselves. You can imagine the scope for corruption and getting rich quickly under these circumstances. So, recruiting ‘an enemy of the people’ as one of his disciples was another thing to make Jesus unpopular. But Jesus’ answer to criticism put things into perspective, ‘It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners’ (v17). We have just seen Jesus forgive the man who was paralysed. He is now making it clear that he has come to minister to those who need forgiveness the most. Of course, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, so Jesus is really using an extreme example to refer to all. It is easy to forgive the good people, but what about the bad? And the example is there for the church to follow. Yes, we can associate and have fellowship with people like ourselves, but the challenge is to be like Jesus and to reach out to the poorest and most disadvantaged in society with the good news of Jesus’ forgiveness.