A Quest

Let's pray as we stand. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this new day, for these new opportunities, new challenges, and most of all, we thank you for your word. We pray that it might be a light to our paths as we think on it this morning. We pray this in Jesus' name, Amen.

Please be seated. We are in Mark chapter 1 on page 990, and over these weeks we are thinking about Mark's gospel as great literature. Every great story has a beginning that gets you in—that's what we thought about last week—and every great story has a quest, and that's what we're thinking about today. For as long as we humans have been around, we have been captivated by the quest.

Quests in Fiction and Pop Culture

Do you remember this one? The humble farmhand Wesley must rescue his true love Buttercup from the odious Prince Humperdinck. On the way, he has to negotiate the fire swamp inhabited by giant rats, the cliffs of insanity, the pit of despair, Andre the Giant, and the swordsman Indigo Montoya who utters the immortal line: "Hello, my name is Indigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die." Of course, it was The Princess Bride (1987), still a great film and you should watch it with your grandchildren or a grandparent.,

Think about the classical tales of antiquity of struggle and sacrifice in pursuit of a goal. In Moby Dick, Captain Ahab's quest is to catch the white whale responsible for biting off half his leg. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus Finch's quest is to bring justice to the town of Maycomb by affording Tom Robinson a fair trial. Harry Potter's quest is to defeat Voldemort. Frodo Baggins' quest is to destroy the One Ring. Hollywood is full of quests, and the best video games are programmed around stories of a quest. You, a mere plumber with a stubborn disposition and a freakishly hard head, must rescue Princess Peach from a giant turtle who lives in a castle full of lava. You know it well: Super Mario Brothers (1985).

The Quests of Real Life

But quests aren't simply confined to works of fiction. There is the Australian cricket team's quest to retain the Ashes, the quest to conquer space or at least conquer Mars, or the quest of a political party to be reelected or even reunited. What is your quest? Have you ever stopped to consider what your own personal quest might be? What is it that you're working towards? What is it you're hoping to achieve? What is the dominant paradigm that gets you out of bed every morning?

It's worth thinking about because the reality is we're all trying to achieve something. We all have goals and aspirations, hopes and dreams, whether we articulate them or not. If there are things that you don't like and you don't want, it also follows that there must be things you do like and do want. All conscious human action has a purpose; whether we're aware of it or not, we're all working towards something. We're all trying to get somewhere, and knowing the destination can save you a lot of time on the journey.

The Problem with Goals and Desires

That's probably why everywhere you turn people are asking you to set goals. In employment, people want to know what your goals are. For retirement, what are your investment goals? What is your risk appetite? Knowing what you're working towards helps us to do things better, more quickly, and more efficiently. It focuses our efforts, it gives us direction, it gives us meaning and the motivation to press on despite hardships.

The problem with a quest and the problem with goals is that all too often we fall short. What do you do when you fall short of your goals or you feel like your desires are not being met? Do you abandon them? Do you get rid of the quest? That, of course, is the Buddhist response: rid your life of desire and you rid your life of suffering. Just get rid of the quest.

Sometimes the quest itself can be more ridiculous than sublime. I once worked with a man who told me that he gave up work for a whole year just to play golf, just to get his handicap into single digits. I thought to myself that is a whole revolution around the sun just to get your handicap down into single digits in a game where you hit a ball and walk after it. You could almost sense that he thought this was a very silly thing to have done in his youth.

Jesus’ Quest: The Kingdom of God

According to Jesus, there's something that's bigger and better than even our greatest aspirations, and that's where Mark's story comes in. Jesus the King is on a quest, and as he begins his public ministry, these are the first words that Mark recalls Jesus saying: "The time has come. The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news.",

The kingdom has come, says Jesus, and he might as well have said "I've come," which is another way of saying the King is here in your presence. That is no small thing. The King has arrived, so watch him, see what he does, see what he says, and then you work out what the kingdom is all about. Jesus tells us what to do as well: "Repent." That is, put away all your resistance to God and believe the good news.

The Calling of the First Disciples

I want to focus on the calling of the first disciples. He finds Andrew and Simon casting their nets and he says, "Come and follow me." And they do; they get up, they leave their nets, they leave the family business, and they follow him. Then a little bit later on he finds James and John, the sons of Zebedee, in the boat preparing their nets. He calls them and they leave their father in the boat and they follow him.,

If you wonder why these perfectly normal people would do this having heard just a short word from Jesus, the answer is Mark's summarizing. We would presume that these men had spent time with Jesus, asked their questions, and talked over what he was doing. It does not mean they walked away from everything—their property, their boats, or their jobs—just to walk around Galilee forever. We see they still had boats and family. In chapter 2, Jesus is at Simon's house and he cures Simon's mother-in-law.

What it Means to Follow

They don't seem to have left them completely; in fact, to walk away from everything you know would be absurd. But what it means is from then on everything took second place to Jesus and his quest. It's a reminder for us today that to be part of Jesus' quest is to be a follower. I once knew a lady, a missionary in New Guinea, who thought life was pretty simple: two steps—follow Jesus and hang on to your hat because anything could happen.

For James and John and Peter and Andrew, they could not have known where it led. James had a very short quest, John's quest was very long, Peter had a very famous quest, and Andrew's quest was largely unknown. Jesus says in verse 17, "Come follow me and I'll make you fishers of men." Fishing's great, but I'm going to teach you how to catch people. They'll take this kingdom of God and bring people into the blessing of the new kingdom.,

The Calling of Levi (Matthew)

Is this king someone you want to follow? You’ve got to work that one out for yourself. If you want to know what kind of people they will fish for, have a look at the calling of Levi. There in chapter 2, Jesus calls a man who should not be in the team at all. Jesus saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector's booth. "Follow me," Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.

Think for a moment of someone with a very, very poor public perception. Levi was a Jewish tax official working for Herod Antipas, the Roman-appointed governor. He wasn't a popular man. He collected taxes on what people carried and he could charge pretty much what he liked because he had the power of Rome behind him. Because of that, tax collectors were thought of as traitors and were excluded from the people of God.,

A Quest for the "Non-Qualifiers" Jesus chooses some honorable fishermen and a very dishonorable tax collector who is an outsider. It's a good reminder that the quest to catch people is not to catch "good" or "honorable" people. Jesus goes to a banquet at Levi's house and there's a whole bunch of people just like Levi. Maybe it's like that old saying: one beggar trying to tell another beggar where to find bread.

Jesus is described as being there and eating with them, which is a form of association. Jesus likes them, and they like his company as well. The Pharisees are literally the separationists, but Jesus is the joiner; he builds bridges. We find this so hard, don't we? We need Christ's help to not be judgmental, to be friends with all sorts of people, but not to be co-opted by them either. We need God's help to love people like Christ loves them, even though you might not approve of what they do or how they live.

Being on Jesus' quest is not like being in the Australian cricket team where you make the team if you have talent and practice hard. Jesus isn't interested in that because he knows every single person is a "non-qualifier." Personally, we know what it's like to have a big gulf between what we know, what we say, and what we do. Therefore, we need a Savior.,

The Ultimate Destination

They don't need a new religious system; they need a new heart, a new soul, and a new life. That is the quest he calls them on: repent and believe. The family business is fishing for people wherever you find yourself. So what about you? Are you on the quest? Have you embraced this kingdom of God?

It's a kingdom that at first glance might seem small, but it's going to ultimately end up bigger than all the kingdoms of the earth combined. It's a kingdom that involves you standing before your Creator cleansed from all your sin, freed from all your guilt, spared of all your shame. It's a kingdom where you'll finally be the person you were designed and intended to be.,

Jesus in his generosity says, "Join me to be part of the coming kingdom." You do this by following the King, by loving God, loving one another, and calling on others to do the same. It will mean making all other quests secondary, but in a beautiful irony, you'll get not only that which you truly want, but that which you truly need.

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