“The People Jesus Attracted”
8/18/24
Mark 1:35-37 “Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed. 36 Simon and his companions went to look for him, 37 and when they found him, they exclaimed: “Everyone is looking for you!”
As you read the four gospels you soon discover that Jesus attracted several different types of people from all walks of life.
Up and outers, down and outers, the good, the bad, and the ugly, the sick, the rich, the poor, “everyone was looking for him.”
I want to take a look at four of those types of people today because the same four types are alive and well today, and are still for various reasons attracted to Jesus.
The first group that sought out Jesus were:
I. The critically Contentious
The CONTENTIOUS were those that attacked, resisted, opposed, and criticized Jesus and Christianity at every turn.
And this type is right now coming out of the woodwork in America and around the world on a whole new level.
They pretend to be religious and pious, “having a form of godliness,” but they “reject the power that could make them godly.”—2 Tim 3:5
Inwardly they are opposed to the real Jesus and His message.
Luke describes this type:
“When Jesus was starting down the Mount of Olives, his large crowd of disciples were happy and praised God because of all the miracles they had seen. They shouted, ‘Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory to God.’ Some Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, make your disciples stop shouting!’”—Luke 19:37-39
The CONTENTIOUS oppose a true commitment to Christ, and seek to muzzle the testimony of true believers.
Jesus nailed the true motivation of the CONTENTIOUS:
“Those who don’t trust him (Christ) have already been tried and condemned for not believing in the only Son of God. 19 Their sentence is based on this fact: that the Light from heaven came into the world, but they loved the darkness more than the Light, for their deeds were evil. 20 They hated the heavenly Light (Jesus) because they wanted to sin in the darkness. They stayed away from that Light for fear their sins would be exposed and they would be punished.”—Jn 3:18-20 LB
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After the CONTENTIOUS we see:
II. The casual CROWD
Great crowds were drawn to hear Jesus!
Mark 3:7 “Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the lake, and a large crowd from Galilee followed.”
Matt. 4:25 “Great multitudes followed Him—from Galilee, and from Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and beyond the Jordan.”
We have an idea of the size of some of the crowds by the account of his feeding of the multitudes.
—And by the way, the feeding of the multitudes is the only miracle Jesus performed that is recorded in all 4 gospels!
Matt 14:21 “The number of those who ate was about five thousand men, besides women and children.”
Most scholars agree that, since most men in those days were married and had families, the crowd Jesus fed numbered around 15,000.
This was a huge crowd, especially since there were no microphones or speakers, no electronic way to carry sound, yet Jesus was heard by all!
Yet, while the CROWDS that Jesus attracted were huge, they were also spiritually shallow.
The large crowds were made up of primarily CASUAL followers, not COMMITTED disciples.
They weren’t really interested in His mission of salvation.
Nor did they have much personal attachment to Him.
In fact, Jesus told them after the miraculous feeding,
“I tell you the truth, you want to be with me because I fed you,”—Jn 6:26
In other words, “You’re not interested in salvation, or a life of sacrifice for me, you just like the free happy meals!”
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When it got down to the deeper stuff that Jesus taught about genuine discipleship, the casual CROWD soon lost their enthusiasm.
John records, “From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.”—John 6:66
From a crowd of five thousand, Jesus lost 4,988 in one sermon!
—Are you part of the CASUAL CROWD, walking around the edges of the Christian faith but never fully diving?
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So Jesus attracted the CRITICALLY CONTENTIOUS, the CASUAL CROWD, and the third group drawn to Him was:
II. The kind of CURIOUS
Those that were kind of curious about him based on what they’d heard.
Matt 21:10 “When Jesus came to Jerusalem, everyone in the city was excited and asked, “Who can this be?”
John 12:17-18 “A crowd had come to meet Jesus because they had seen Him call Lazarus out of the tomb. They kept talking about Him, and this miracle.”
They had heard enough about Jesus to make them curious.
For instance, we read that, “King Herod was delighted when Jesus showed up (for his trial). He had wanted for a long time to see him, he’d heard so much about him. He hoped to see him do something spectacular.”—Lk. 23:8
Herod was part of the CURIOUS crowd!
But he didn’t want the real Jesus—he wanted a circus ringmaster, a magician, an entertainer, not a Savior!
The CURIOUS didn’t and don’t today recognize Jesus for who He truly is.
They may see him as a good man, a prophet, a wise man, or a miracle worker.
Yet they never grasp the gravity of His mission and that he came—to “seek and to save that which was lost,” including them!
John writes this about the curious crowd: “He had worked a lot of miracles among the people, but they were still not willing to have faith in Him.”—John 12:37
The curious crowd wanted to be entertained, not saved.
—Unfortunately our churches are full of people who fit the CURIOUS mold.
They never really surrender control of their lives to the Lord.
They come to church to see what its all about.
They may have seen a lot of cars in the parking lot.
Or they might be curious about the music, or something they’ve heard about the preacher.
They may be initially curious about why friends or family are attending.
But they’re not really looking for an encounter with God.
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On top of that, the curious are often driven by wrong motivations.
For instance, many in Jesus’s day thought that He was going to overthrow the Roman government and take political control of the country!
Misled expectations were the drivers that drew the curious to Jesus.
Is this the one the Prophets wrote about? They curiously wondered.
Likewise, many today are curious to see if Jesus will be their piggy bank, their fast track to health and wealth, like they’ve heard claimed on Christian TV.
They’re curious if following Jesus will make life easier, if they’ll just float from one blessing to the next.
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And I have seen that the CURIOUS may even confess that Jesus is Lord, but they are never changed.
Nor do they order their lifestyle around his teachings, or follow him as committed disciples.
Their profession is often based on temporary curiosity without true repentance, so it is shallow and easily shaken, never truly rooted in genuine faith.
The curiosity that drew them to Jesus soon fades, and they move on to the next shiny object that grabs their attention.
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So there were the CONTENTIOUS, the CROWD, the CURIOUS, and then there was a fourth and final group that were:
IV. The completely COMMITTED
Like Peter, the completely committed say, “Lord, there is no one else that we can go to! (Only) Your words give eternal life?”—John 6:68
A COMMITTED follower of Christ is one who seeks to follow His leading in all things.
They recognize Him as Lord over everything in their life.
He’s not part of their life, He IS their life!
They understand Christ’s mission of bringing a lost and dying world to salvation through Him, and happily join with Him in that endeavor.
They don’t just dip their toe in the pool of Christianity, they dive completely in!
And they exhibit a sincere desire to grow into His likeness.
When it comes to Jesus, the COMMITTED are ALL IN!
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Now, here’s a question—Which One Are You?
The critically CONTENTIOUS?
The casual CROWD?
The kind of CURIOUS?
Or, the completely COMMITTED?
NEWS FLASH: None of the first three are headed to heaven when they die.
Only the authentically born again, completely committed ones have eternal life!