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The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural Mark 12:18-27 05/06/2007 Dr. Dane Boyles. The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural. Introduction: In Mark 12:18-27, Jesus runs into a group of Sadducees who are trying to disprove a supernatural religion. The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural.
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The Religion of Jesus Is SupernaturalMark 12:18-2705/06/2007Dr. Dane Boyles
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • Introduction: • In Mark 12:18-27, Jesus runs into a group of Sadducees who are trying to disprove a supernatural religion.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • Now bear in mind just who they are talking to. • Jesus is the fulfillment of 1093 Old Testament prophecies. • He was born of a virgin.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • He fasted 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness and was tempted by the devil. • He drove out evil spirits and rebuked demons. • He healed the blind, the crippled, the deaf and mute, and brought the dead back to life again.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • He calmed the sea. • He fed 5,000 men and their familieswith 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish with 12 basketfuls of bread and fish left over. • He calmed the storm, walked on water.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • He showed incomparable wisdomin his teaching; the people were amazed! • Yet the Sadducees present Jesus with this seemingly unsolvable scenario.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • What is it that makes people so blind to the Person and purposes of God? • And why is that people try to make religion natural and ordinary?
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural 18Then the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to him with a question. 19“Teacher,” they said, “Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies and leaves a wife but no children, the man must marry the widow and have children for his brother. (Mark 12:18-19)
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural 20Now there were seven brothers. The first one married and died without leaving any children.21The second one married the widow, but he also died, leaving no child. It was the same with the third. 22In fact, none of the seven left any children. Last of all, the woman died too. (Mark 12:20-22)
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural 23At the resurrection whose wife will she be, since the seven were married to her?” 24Jesus replied, “Are you not in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God? (Mark 12:23-24)
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural 25When the dead rise, they will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven. (Mark 12:25)
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural 26 Now about the dead rising-have you not read in the book of Moses, in the account of the bush, how God said to him, ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? 27He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. You are badly mistaken!” (Mark 12:26-27, NIV)
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • In the case of the Sadducees, they are blind to the Person and purposes of God because of their own prejudices and presuppositions.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • Background of the Sadducees. • The Sadducees were the aristocracy. • They were the ones who controlled and supervised Temple worship. • They also controlled the Sanhedrin. • They gave Jesus a hard time.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural 48If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.” (John 11:48, NIV)
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • The Belief of the Sadducees. • The Sadducees were all about themselves. • Why would they do this? • Because of what they believed about God. • They didn’t start with God & his Word but with their traditions and man-made theology.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • No, they had chosen to believe in another kind of God. • This is what people do when they have a problem with God and the supernatural. • The litmus test for this kind of religion: deny God’s control over men and circumstances.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • They denied the “spiritual world.” • They denied the resurrection. • They used their religious standing for political ends and used religion not as a means of finding God but as a tool for controlling people.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • Are their Modern Day Sadducees? • Are their people who deny the supernatural in religion? • People want to save the “good stuff.” • But they want to throw away the “bad stuff.” • You can’t divorce Jesus from the supernatural!
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • We Must Be Aware of the Danger of Ignoring the Supernatural. • These people don’t outright deny the supernatural. • They simply ignore these things.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • But that is not the religion of Jesus. • Don’t confuse the miraculous and the supernatural! • Here’s What We Can Learn from Jesus. • We must know the Scriptures.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural 24Jesus replied, “Are you not in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God? (Mark 12:24) • We must know the power of God.
The Religion of Jesus Is Supernatural • Conclusion • Jesus had to face people in his own time who tried to limit God to the ordinary and the explainable.
The Religion of Jesus Is SupernaturalMark 12:18-2705/06/2007Dr. Dane Boyles