The Light and The Leaven

Transcript

Welcome to this week’s sermon from Trinity Church in Portland, Oregon. We hope this message inspires you, roots you down deep into the Lord, into His Word, and may His Spirit be your guide as you enjoy this teaching. Thanks for joining us. Here’s the message. Our scripture passage from this morning is found in Mark chapter 8, verses 11-21.

The Pharisees came and began to argue with Him, seeking from Him a sign from heaven to test Him. And He sighed deeply in His Spirit and said, Why does this generation seek a sign? Truly I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation. And He left them, got into the boat again, and went to the other side. Now they had forgotten to bring bread, and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. And He cautioned them, saying, Watch out! Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod

— Mark 8

(ESV)

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The Hardness of Heart

And they began discussing with one another the fact that they had no bread. And Jesus, aware of this, said to them, Why are you discussing the fact that you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear? And do you not remember? When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up? They said to Him, Twelve. And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up? And they said to Him, Seven. And He said to them, Do you not yet understand

— Mark 8

(ESV)

? This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Well, everybody knows the Bible verse, John 3, 16. It’s so popular that even non-Christians can almost quote it perfectly.

For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. It’s a powerful verse. It’s an encouraging verse. But most people stop reading the passage at verse 16, but the rest of the passage goes on to say, For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him, whoever believes in Him is not condemned. Still very encouraging. But as you continue to read the verse, it gets a bit shaky. Whoever does not believe is condemned already because he’s not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment. The light has come into the world and the people love the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light lest

his works should be exposed. So what begins as extremely encouraging ends with a very sober truth. All humans have a predisposition to love the darkness. Every human is born a rebellious sinner, inclined to all kinds of evil, with a bent to love and live in the darkness. We’re born spiritually blind, incapable of seeing or understanding spiritual realities on our own. Yes, we might see certain aspects of the man Jesus. You could watch the History Channel and get a biography of Jesus and gain some perspective from a biographical perspective. You can learn about the life and ministry of Jesus from reading books. But because of sin, without the aid of God who helps you to see spiritual things clearly, you will never see Jesus as the Son of God or his gospel fully or beautifully. You will always be naturally more inclined to love what is evil than what is true, good

and beautiful about Jesus. No matter how much you buck against this reality, it is what it is. This has always been the case. The scripture testifies that we are born with hearts hardened to the truth and beauty of the gospel, which is why you and I and the rest of the world desperately need spiritual intervention. Not only do we need new hearts, we talked about it a few weeks ago, we also have to be given spiritual eyes to see Jesus fully and beautifully. Our spiritual blindness is an internal problem. It comes from hearts that desire to live in the darkness. And without supernatural help, we would never choose to live in the light, which then renders us condemned. But our spiritual blindness is also an external problem. We’re also spiritual blind because Satan is at work doing everything possible to keep people blinded to what is true, good and beautiful about Jesus.

Second Corinthians 4.4 says, the God of this world, that is Satan, has blinded the minds of unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. So we’re all born blind. And sadly, some will remain spiritually blind only to wander around in the darkness their entire life and the life to come. To never desire an appetite for the light because they themselves don’t want it and because Satan is at work keeping them lovers of the darkness. But some, by the grace of God, will be given new eyes to see spiritual realities. And we will always be grateful to God. But even with those new eyes, we will only be able to see spiritual realities in part because of the residual effects of sin. We see only certain realities of the spiritual dimension. And this is in many ways what we’ll see so plainly in our text this morning, the varying

degrees of spiritual blindness, the complete blindness that comes from the hardness of heart and the momentary partial blindness that comes from spiritual dullness. And again, as Mark consistently does throughout his gospel, he’ll help us to understand these varying degrees by way of contrast. And again, he does it with the Pharisees and the disciples. So in our first section this morning, we’ll see the spiritual blindness of the religious Pharisees, those who are on the outside who are in opposition to Jesus, and how their spiritual blindness is a direct result of hard hearts. They’ll never understand. They’ll never see. No matter how much they see with their physical eyes, they will never come to know the truth fully. And in the second section, we’ll look at the partial spiritual blindness of the disciples, that even though they’ve been given new hearts and new eyes to see who Jesus really is, because

of the effects of sin, their hearts are dulled to certain spiritual realities. So they see spiritually only in part. But our passage this morning is more than just the realities of spiritual blindness. We also get a picture of the patience of Jesus, both in a negative and positive sense. And you see, again, Mark’s contrast. We’ll see the limited patience of Jesus when it comes to the hard heartedness of the Pharisees, and we’ll see the long-suffering patience of Jesus when it comes to the spiritual dullness of his disciples. And so this morning, I’ve broken our passage into two sections, very simple. In verses 11 through 13, we’ll see the hardness of heart, and in verses 14 through 21, we’ll look at the dullness of heart. So let’s begin first with the hardness of heart, verse 11. The Pharisees came and began to argue with him, seeking from him a sign from heaven to

test him. And he sighed deeply in his spirit and said, why does this generation seek a sign? Truly, I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation. And he left them, got into the boat again, and went to the other side. Well, if you remember last week, immediately following the feeding of the 4,000, Jesus and his disciples had gotten into the boat. They left the Gentile region with the Gentile people and made their way to the district of Dalmanutha, a Jewish region. And right when they arrive, the Pharisees immediately approached Jesus, and the conflict picks right back up where it left off the last time. You remember this is the consistent posture of the Pharisees towards Jesus. Their hearts were so hardened towards Jesus and his ministry, they just couldn’t contain their outrage. And so it almost seems as if they’ve been waiting for Jesus to come back to the Jewish

region because they have more conflict, because they still have beef with Jesus. And like bullies on a playground after school, they approach Jesus looking for a fight. Right when they see him, they go in. The text says they begin to argue with Jesus, but that word argue is better translated to aggressively debate, to have a fight with words. And really what they’re looking for here, what they’re longing for is some sort of verification or authentication from the God of heaven. They want Jesus to back up his authoritative claims. They’ve heard what Jesus has had to say. They’ve heard what he said, and in the hardness of their hearts, they don’t believe a word of it. And never mind the fact that they’ve seen all kinds of miraculous signs from Jesus, they’ve seen with their own eyes all these amazing things that Jesus has done. Even the Pharisee named Nicodemus, who was a leader of the Pharisees, said to Jesus,

we know you are a teacher who came from God because no one can do the signs that you do unless God is with him. You see, even though they were looking for a sign, a sign was never going to be enough to satisfy or convince these Pharisees. I mean, they’ve already seen sign after sign. Jesus has performed countless miracles, and what they did is attribute the signs and the miraculous works to the work of Satan. So it didn’t matter how many signs they’ve seen or how much empirical evidence they’ve seen, they were never going to see the truth because they were spiritually blind and because their hearts were hardened. And so Jesus, knowing this reality, performs no sign for these people. He won’t be tested by these Pharisees in any way. And here’s what’s interesting. Because of their spiritual blindness, these so-called experts of the Old Testament, the

ones who knew the Old Testament so well, failed to see the extent of what they were doing. They were testing the Lord God. In their arrogance and pride, they were actually breaking God’s law. In Deuteronomy 6.16, it clearly states, you shall not put the Lord your God to the test. And that’s exactly what they were doing. And so Jesus sighs deeply in his spirit. And the reason for this deep sigh is because the patience of Jesus has been pushed to the limit with these hard-hearted Pharisees. And when Jesus says, truly, I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation, this is a promise from God. This is an oath and a judgment. Jesus is fed up, and he’s leaving these Pharisees and all those who follow in their footsteps dead in their helplessness and spiritual blindness. There is no hope for these Pharisees.

So Jesus’ last words to these Pharisees are, you’re not going to get a sign from me. This generation is not going to see a sign. And then Jesus actually does something here that’s more powerful than words. He just leaves them. He leaves them. He doesn’t give them a sign. He doesn’t reason with them. He doesn’t try to persuade them about their hard-heartedness. He just gets up and leaves them in their hard-hearted unbelief. He gets in the boat, and he moves on. Jesus has lost his patience with these religious leaders. And you see, this is something we don’t really talk about much. But there is a limit to the patience of Jesus. If you reject Jesus long enough, if you continue to reject the light of the world, he will eventually leave you in the dark, dead in your sins. And that, brothers and sisters, is a terrifying reality, to be left in the dark by Jesus.

And so for those of you who are here this morning who don’t know Jesus, who don’t know the light of the world, let this be a warning to you. Instead of pushing the patience of Jesus to the limit, embrace Jesus quickly. Ask him to forgive you of your sins. Call upon Jesus to bring you peace with God. Embrace Jesus this morning as Lord and Savior to pull you out of the darkness. Because if you continue to walk in the darkness with no regard for the light, you will eventually find the patience of God will run out with you. But if you embrace him quickly, if you embrace him this morning, he will show you mercy and save you from your sin. First John 1.7 says, but if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus, his son, cleanses us from all sin.

The Dullness of Heart

Jesus offers himself freely to you this morning. And the very fact that you’re hearing this truth this morning is a result of his patience for you. But there is a limit to his patience, so respond this morning, trust and believe that he is who he says he is. In fact, that’s what it means to walk in the light. It means to walk in the reality that Jesus truly is the light of the world. So there is a spiritual blindness that comes from the hardness of heart, which we see so clearly with these Pharisees. But there’s also a spiritual blindness that comes from the dullness of heart. And we see that in verses 14 through 21. In verse 14, now, they had forgotten to bring bread and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. And he cautioned them saying, watch out, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven

of Herod. So in their quick departure, following the conflict with the Pharisees, the disciples had failed to bring with them all the leftover bread. And as Jesus was thinking through this conflict with the Pharisees, who demanded from him a sign, and as he hears that his disciples had forgotten bread and they only have one loaf of bread, Jesus calls their attention. Now, I can just imagine Jesus’s train of thought here. The disciples had left all of the bread behind, all of the bread that he miraculously provided to feed the 4,000 people they left behind. And as he’s thinking about that miraculous sign, his mind shifts to the miraculous sign of the exorcism of the Syrophoenician woman’s daughter. And he recalls her response that says, even the dogs under the table can eat the children’s breadcrumbs. And so as he’s thinking about the Pharisees demanding a sign and he recalls all the signs

that he’s recently provided for the people, he draws the common thread among these miracles and signs, and that’s the thread of bread. So he’s thinking about the conflict and he’s thinking about the bread and he uses the thread of bread to warn his disciples. And so he says to his disciples, watch out, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the leaven of Herod. And in Matthew’s account in chapter 16, verse 6, Jesus said to them, watch and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. So Matthew adds the Sadducees to that group. So Jesus uses the illustration of the leaven of bread to warn his disciples about the sin of the Pharisees, Sadducees, and Herod. But the disciples are so fixed on the fact that they forgot bread that they totally missed the warning. Look at verse 16. And they began discussing with one another the fact that they had no bread.

And Jesus, aware of this, said to them, why are you discussing the fact that you have no bread? So it’s here where you really see the spiritual dullness of the disciples pop. Jesus warns about the leaven of the Pharisees, Sadducees, and the Herodians, and all they can think about is literal bread. And they can’t quite figure out what Jesus means by all this. Is Jesus warning us not to buy bread from the Pharisees? I mean, what’s the issue concerning buying bread from the Herodians? They don’t get it. But one thing is for sure, one thing that they do understand is that they’re hungry and that they’re in the middle of nowhere and that they don’t have enough food. So think about this. Whereas the Pharisees were preoccupied with a heavenly sign, the disciples here were preoccupied with earthly issues like food. Remember the crowd of 4,000 Gentiles, the outsiders?

They were so preoccupied with Jesus and his spiritual realities, they went without food for three days. They had no concern for food. Here his own disciples, the insiders, were so concerned about missing a meal that they miss Jesus’s warning. Jesus is thinking about the serious spiritual implications connected with this conflict of the Pharisees. The disciples were only thinking about their physical needs. They were partially blinded to the spiritual realities of the situation because they were preoccupied with earthly realities. I mean, it’s almost as if Jesus is shocked by their lack of concern for what just went down with the Pharisees. I mean, you would think that the disciples would be asking Jesus questions about this conflict like, Jesus, why didn’t you give them a sign? You’ve been performing all these signs and miracles. Why did they not get a sign? Why did you leave them in their spiritual blindness?

You gave us eyes to see spiritual realities. Why did you leave them? Or what was it about these Pharisees that pushed your patience to the limits? And most importantly, how can we avoid that kind of hard-heartedness? But they said nothing. No big deal, just another conflict with the Pharisees. They don’t ask Jesus any questions about this conflict, and so Jesus initiates and asks them questions. In fact, eight questions, six of them rhetorical, two of them more Socratic in nature, but all eight of these questions meant to lead them to greater spiritual understanding. So look at the second half of verse 17, and we’ll get a scope of these questions. Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Having eyes do you not see? Having ears do you not hear? And do you not remember when I broke the five loaves for the 5,000?

How many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up? They said to him, 12. And the seven for the 4,000, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up? And they said to him, seven. And he said to them, do you not yet understand? Do you not understand these spiritual realities? You are my insiders, to you have been given eyes to see and ears to hear. Why are you not paying attention to these spiritual realities? The answer, of course, is that they were so focused on earthly realities. They were only thinking about food. They didn’t care to think about the greater spiritual realities. But it’s here in these questions where you get a picture of the long-suffering patience of Jesus. He asked these questions because they’re not thinking properly. The fact that he takes the time to ask them questions is an expression of his patience.

But listen, just because he is patient with his disciples doesn’t mean that he won’t rebuke them. His patience is not without sharp rebuke. In fact, it is his love and patience for his disciples that causes such a long and exhaustive rebuke with these questions. Remember with the Pharisees, his response was terse and dismissive. He ended abruptly because he had lost his patience with the Pharisees. But here Jesus will explain and teach his disciples in the form of these chastising questions. And listen, don’t misunderstand. This kind of chastisement is an expression of love. Hebrews 12, 6 says the Lord chastens those whom he loves. He chastens them, but he doesn’t do it in a way that is ultra demeaning. He doesn’t call them stupid or ignorant. Instead he questions them into greater wisdom. His questions are meant to help lead them to self-realize the error and foolishness

of their thinking or their lack of thinking. See that’s what questions oftentimes do. They help guide people into self-realized correction. I mean we do this with our children, don’t we? We ask questions to lead them into greater wisdom. Questions like, do you think that’s a good decision? How do you think it makes your brother feel when you just take his Legos? Did we not talk about this last night? Is there a better way to ask for help than just kicking your brother? I mean my wife is amazing at this. She does it all the time. I’m still learning. And she oftentimes uses questions to help me learn how to ask better questions. But not only does he ask these questions to help lead them to greater wisdom, he also uses these questions to rebuke them for not being focused when it comes

Beware the Leaven

to spiritual things and to help them heed his warning. Now what exactly is the warning that Jesus wanted them to heed? Well he wanted to warn them about the leaven, the small amount of yeast that causes bread to rise. And here Jesus uses leaven as an illustration of sin, predominantly the sin of false teaching. Jesus warns his disciples and us, be warned about the various expressions of false teaching that come from these three groups, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Herodians. Now what was their specific expression of leaven or false teaching? Well first you have the Pharisees. Their leaven was religious legalism. They were separatists who avoided pagan culture and promoted a works-based religion. They were religious hypocrites who placed their trust in Jewish tradition and strict rigid adherence to the law to pacify God or to maintain some sort of good standing with God.

Then you have the Sadducees. Their leaven was theological liberalism. They were assimilators into the culture. They promoted religious rationalism and did not believe in the whole of scripture. In fact they prized human wisdom and intellectual relevance as more important than the scriptures. And they did this hoping to make religion more accessible and palatable to a pagan Greek culture. And finally you have Herod or the Herodians. Their leaven was political secularism. They were curators of culture, irreligious Jewish nationalists who viewed political power, military might, and social influence as the greatest hope for humanity. And so Jesus deeply concerned about the pervasive influence of legalism, liberalism, and secularism strongly warns his disciples, watch out for this kind of teaching. You need to be careful for this kind of false teaching. Because it’s false. Because the influence of their false teaching is dark and distorted and deadly. All of these groups are corrupt institutions made by wicked men to maintain some sort of

religious influence and political power. All three of these groups are in direct opposition to the kingdom of God and the purity of his gospel. Jesus is warning if you take any part of it, if you are influenced even in the slightest by this false teaching, even the smallest trace amount will completely destroy you and lead you deep into the darkness. Like leaven, the smallest amount causes for bread to rise, so it is with false teaching. The smallest amount causes for great sin to rise and kill. And this warning is so strong because these disciples are the ones who have been called to preach and teach the kingdom of God. They are the ones who will be commissioned by God to take the pure message of the gospel to the ends of the earth to teach and to baptize all nations. And they need to know.

They need to know that legalism, liberalism, and secularism is so pervasive in the culture and is so pragmatic that as they’re going and doing the hard work of ministry, as they’re teaching and preaching, they’re going to feel the pull towards religious legalism. The pull towards behavior modification. Because producing morally upright people can oftentimes give the perception that you’re producing spiritual fruit. They’re going to feel the draw towards theological liberalism to unhinge from the rigid and narrow theological views that oftentimes tend to make the gospel unattractive to a pagan world. Because it’s easier to preach humanistic, feel-good messages void of hard truth than it actually is to give hard truth, especially if the ultimate aim is to draw as many people as possible. They’re going to feel the allure of political secularism to rely on politics and policy to create a world that makes the preaching and teaching of the gospel easier.

To place their hope and trust in a Christian nation without the fear of persecution and alienation. Because humanly speaking, policy produces better results than the seemingly foolish and supernatural power of the gospel. The disciples need to know that as attractive and as effective as these false teachers appear to be, it’s false teaching and leads people to greater degrees of darkness. Even the smallest amount of their false teaching has a corrupting power that kills the purity and message of the gospel, and it ultimately leaves people spiritually blind to the light. And it doesn’t matter how much these systems profess to have the light, legalism, liberalism, and secularism will always, always lead you to the darkness. Because they’re man-made systems with man-centered outcomes. But Christianity, pure Christianity, is not about man-made religious systems. It’s not about relevance and influence. It’s not about placing hope in human wisdom or politics.

It’s about Jesus Christ submitting to his lordship. It’s about denying to self-interest and self-preservation. It’s about living for a different kingdom and a different king. Giving people the plain and simple message of Jesus and his gospel is the only way to lead people into the light. And this is why Jesus warns them so strongly. Because all those systems, with all that false teaching, is leading people to hell. Jesus says to his disciples, do you not yet understand? This is why I left those evil, arrogant, spiritually blind, hard-hearted Pharisees so abruptly. Because though they profess to be spiritual leaders and claim to be promoting people into the truth, they’re actually leading people to hell with their false teaching. So the Lord does sharply rebuke the disciples, but in so doing, he leads them to greater understanding. In fact, in Matthew’s account, in verse 12, it tells us, then they understood that he

did not tell them to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees. And listen, you need to understand this warning. Because this is precisely where we are today. In fact, we live in the epicenter of legalism, liberalism, and secularism. It’s so pervasive in our culture. It’s so influential in our culture, we must guard ourselves from it. You see, the truth is, there is a proneness, even for the Christian, to attach themselves to one of these three categories. In fact, some Christians, to varying degrees, ping from one of these categories to the other. And in some cases, they can fall into a few of these categories at the same time. You can follow a liberal theology because you’re trying to make room for secular humanism. You can be a legalist, a religious fundamentalist with deep roots in political secularism.

You can even make political secularism a new religion with extremely liberal theology and be legalistic about it at the same time. Because you really believe that is the key to human flourishing. Because you believe that is the hope for humanity and to have peace with God. I mean, this is where we are right now. Wake up. Religious legalists, fundamentalists, who trust in Trump and his policies to save our world from losing the culture war, theological liberals, ecumenical and social driven, who place their confidence in Biden and his secular policies to make the world less divisive. Christians are actually latching on to these systems because they believe that they’re functional saviors. I mean, we are living in a culture where professing Christians have made a complete amalgamation of legalism, liberalism and secularism. Listen, we’ve only seen that kind of joining together of systems when we saw the crucifixion.

The legalism, liberalism and secularism joined forces to kill Jesus. And that’s exactly what’s happening today. All three have again joined forces in an attempt to kill Christianity. And this time it’s happening from within, using Christians who have taken the bait of false teaching. And why have they taken the bait? Because it seems so appealing and so effective on the surface. It seems to promote human flourishing. It seems to promote hope for humanity and peace with God, but it’s wicked when mixed with the gospel. And all those things will eventually lead to death and eternal darkness. You see, only Jesus can provide the kind of human flourishing, the kind of hope for humanity and peace with God the world is looking for. If you really want human flourishing, if you really want hope, if you truly want peace with God, you need the gospel, the pure unaltered truth of the gospel.

Walking in the Light

You need a system that has Jesus at the center of it, not man. Jesus is the light of the world. And whoever follows him will not walk in the darkness, but have the light of life. There is no other way to make it out of the darkness. No human system will help you find the light. In fact, those systems are led by spiritually blind people. So if you anchor yourself to them, if you follow after them, it will simply be the blind leading the blind. So brothers and sisters, I’ll close this morning with this. As we follow Jesus in these dark days, we need to look to the light. We need to walk in the light as he is in the light. We need to heed this warning. Beware of the leaven of religious legalism, of theological liberalism, and of political secularism. Even in the smallest amount, it’s deadly.

Galatians 5.9 says a little leaven leavens the whole lump. And I want to be honest with you this morning. I have seen the leaven of legalism, liberalism, and secularism within the church. I’ve seen it with close friends, and I’ve even seen it with some of the people in this church. And that has caused me great concern. If the leaven has influenced you, if it’s influenced you, you need to know that if you continue to entertain it, it will only spread and permeate into deeper degrees of darkness. It will ultimately destroy you. I have seen it completely decimate people who profess to be Christians. You must fight against it. We must pray that God protect us from it. We must in love call it out when we see it. We must hold firm to correct doctrine, to right teaching. We must remind each other of the pure message of the gospel.

We must heed God’s warning to run from the darkness of false teaching and its influence in this culture and walk in the light. We need to be a congregation that takes on the characteristics of Christ and his teaching, not the characteristics of our culture, who are so completely blinded and under the influence of legalism, liberalism, and secularism. Brothers and sisters, we need nothing but the true religion of Jesus and his gospel. This is our only hope for these dark days. I know this is a strong warning that Jesus lays out for his disciples, but this is a strong warning for us that Jesus has laid out for us. We would be wise to not be spiritually dull like the disciples and heed his warning. Let’s pray. Our Father and our God, we are so thankful that you warn us to what is so deadly about

false teaching. Father, we see that the warning, the strong rebuke, is ultimately because you love us. You love your church, and you desire the purity and holiness of your church. Father, we pray that we would be a congregation that heeds your warning, that listens and runs from the darkness of false teaching, and hides ourself in the truth, the pure truth of your word, the pure truth of your gospel, the true and pure truth of Jesus Christ, our risen Savior. Help us to hide this warning deep in our hearts, and help us to live with that warning constantly before our eyes as we see so many friends and so many Christians succumbing to false teaching. Help us to be bold, to go after them in love with the truth. We pray these things in Christ’s name, amen. Thanks for joining us for this week’s sermon from Trinity Church in Portland, Oregon.

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