EVERYONE IS SEARCHING FOR YOU

by King Duncan

Mark 1:29-39

Two of our greatest presidents were born in February. On February 12 we celebrate Abraham Lincoln's birthday. It is said that this homely Illinois lawyer once walked a mile to return a penny. He signed his name to the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, and with the stroke of a pen freed 13 million people.

On February 22 we celebrate the birthday of George Washington. It was Washington who knelt in prayer at the mouth of the Potomac before leading his army to victory over the British. Known as the father of our country, he too was celebrated as a man of honor as well as a man of valor.

We thank God for men like Washington and Lincoln, but their significance in human history is dwarfed by a simple carpenter who lived in the little town of Nazareth 2000 years ago. As Robert W. Youngs has put it:

• Men have always praised and honored certain men in their own generation; but Jesus they have considered as an object of devotion. Men recite poems about Paul Revere, but they sing hymns about Jesus. They construct monuments in memory of their statesmen; communion tables in memory of Jesus. Before kings and queens, men bow and women curtsy; before Jesus they all kneel in prayer. (1)
• "Toward the end of the 15th century, all of Europe was caught in the lull of despair and hopelessness. There was such dismay that people widely believed that the end of the world was coming very soon. In the year 1492 a German author produced a book entitled THE NUREMBERG CHRONICLE. It was a compendium of all the calamities that had befallen the human family up to that moment. Then, with a climax of dejection, the author invited the reader to use blank pages at the end of the book to record any further catastrophes that would occur before the not-too-distant end of the world. The next year there sailed into the harbor of Lisbon a battered little sailing ship. It had come through storms in the Atlantic. At the helm was a man whose story was too amazing to be true. He spoke, not about the end of the world, but about a new world of endless possibilities. Of course, you know his name -- Christopher Columbus. Just when things looked their worst, something happened which changed despair to hope." (2)

That was the kind of effect that Jesus of Nazareth had upon our world. Because of those lonely hours Jesus spent on the cross, we sometimes forget just how popular Jesus was when he first began his ministry. The scene we have in our Scripture lesson takes place at the house of Simon Peter, where Jesus heals Simon's mother-in-law. Some cynic has said that Simon probably regarded this miracle with mixed feelings.

But notice what Mark tells us next: "That evening, at sundown, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons. And the whole city was gathered together about the door. . ." (RSV)

Think of that, "The whole city was gathered at his door. . ." Imagine what it would be like if even a part of our town gathered spontaneously in one place. But everyone there wanted to see Jesus.

A little further on we read, "And in the morning, a great while before day, he rose and went out to a lonely place, and there he prayed. And Simon, and those who were with him followed him, and said to him, `Everyone is searching for you. . .'"

I don't know how to say it without it sounding like a platitude or a cliche, but I really do believe that all people seek Christ. They may not even know his name, and they might use religious symbols and terminology that is different from what you and I would ever use, but they are searching for Christ all the same. He is the way, the truth, and the life. And all people, everywhere, need what only Christ can offer them.

ONE THING THAT CHRIST OFFERS US IS THE KNOWLEDGE THAT LIFE MAKES SENSE. We need to know that, because life is very difficult when it doesn't make sense.

• Dr. Lee F. Tuttle once told of how, on a certain December morning in 1944, something happened that almost affected the course of the Second World War. The Allied offensive, begun six months before, had rolled with relentless precision across Western Europe. But suddenly, on that December day, a major portion of the mighty juggernaut ground to a halt. A counter-offensive had been launched, and a great bulge in the battle lines appeared. Now if that counter-offensive had succeeded, the end of the war might have been indefinitely delayed. As it was, the drive almost did succeed, and a part of that was due to some brilliant strategy devised by the defenders of the Third Reich. A few days before, German soldiers dressed in American uniforms, together with American jeeps, had been parachuted behind American lines. These "soldiers from the sky" carried no weapons; their mission was to cover the roads over which reinforcing Allied armies might travel and change all the signs which pointed to strategic towns and villages. And this simple task of turning the signposts to give wrong directions had deadly consequences. When the defenders in the "Battle of the Bulge" called for help as the Germans attacked, many of the reinforcements never arrived. Whole battalions were lost while trying to find their way across a countryside where the signposts were either down or wrong. (3)

Dr. Tuttle's point in relating these events was that we live in a time when many of the signposts have been torn down: moral signposts, ethical signposts, theological signposts. Because of this, many of us lose our way in life. Have you ever been lost while traveling? It is a terrible experience. Maps no longer seem to make sense. When other people try to help, it often only makes matters worse. Well, the same thing can happen on the road of life. When we get lost, life no longer makes sense to us.

In Great Britain, there is an epitaph on a tombstone of a three-week-old child that says it for all of us, regardless of our age:

It is so soon that I am done for,
I wonder what I was begun for.

The years pass so quickly. And many of us have no idea what we're here for. We feel lost. But we can turn to Jesus and see in him what we were created to be--sons and daughters of the Divine. We are not merely worms of the dust. We are precious people who have been bought with Christ's blood. When we turn to Jesus, we rediscover our purpose, and life makes sense again. And that is what we all hunger for--the knowledge that life does make sense.

WE HUNGER FOR THAT KNOWLEDGE, AND WE HUNGER TO BELIEVE THAT GOD CAN BE EXPERIENCED. Rollo May, in his book, MAN'S SEARCH FOR HIMSELF, points to this great need. He writes:

• "It may sound surprising when I say, on the basis of my clinical practice as well as that of my psychological and psychiatric colleagues, that the chief problem of people. . . is `emptiness.' By that I mean not only that many people do not know what they want; they often do not have any clear idea of what they feel. When they talk about lack of autonomy, or lament their inability to make decisions--difficulties which are present in all decades--it soon becomes evident that their underlying problem is that they have no definite experience of their own desires or wants. They feel swayed this way and that, with painful feelings of powerlessness, because they feel vacuous, empty. . ." (4)

There is a God-shaped void within the heart and soul of mankind. We have a great need to experience God. It is not enough to believe that He is out there somewhere. That time-honored story of the boy flying the kite so high that the clouds hid it from view is most telling. "How do you know that your kite is still there?" someone asked him. "I can still feel a tug on the string," he answered. Who among us does not need to feel that tug from time to time? It is fine to say that God is out there somewhere in the cosmos, but most of us need to know that he is in here--within the human heart.

For most of us, we first felt that tug when we came to believe in Jesus Christ. I think the distinguished British writer Malcolm Muggeridge put it about as well as it can be put:

• "I may, I suppose, . . . pass for being a relatively successful man. People occasionally stare at me in the streets--that's fame. I can fairly easily earn enough to qualify for admission to the higher slopes of the Internal Revenue--that's success. Furnished with money and a little fame even the elderly, if they care to, may partake of trendy diversions--that's pleasure. It might happen once in a while that something I said or wrote was sufficiently heeded for me to persuade myself that it represented a serious impact on our time--that's fulfillment. Yet, I say to you--and I beg you to believe me--multiply these tiny triumphs by a million, add them all together, and they are nothing--less than nothing, a positive impediment--measured against one drink of that living water Christ offers to the spiritually thirsty, irrespective of who or what they are." (5)

There is an emptiness in our lives that no one but Christ can fill. No wonder the disciples said to him, "Everyone is searching for you. . ." We seek to know that life does make sense, and that God can be experienced, BUT WE ALSO SEEK TO FIND SOME COMPELLING EVIDENCE THAT BOTH LIFE AND DEATH CAN BE CONQUERED.

There is an old legend in which Dr. Faust gambled his soul away to the devil. One artist has represented the legend as a game of chess, with Faust on one side and Satan on the other. The game in the painting is almost over, and Faust has only a few pieces left: a king, a knight, and a couple of pawns. There is a look of blank despair on the Doctor's face, while at the other side of the board the devil leers in anticipation of his coming triumph. Many chess players have examined the picture, and they all agreed that the situation is helpless; it is checkmate: Faust has lost. But one day a great chess master was in the gallery, and he gazed at the picture for a long time. He was mesmerized by the look of terrible despair on the face of Faust. And he was fascinated by the arrangement of the chess pieces as the game drew to its conclusion. He stared at the board, totally absorbed by it. And suddenly the gallery rang with a triumphant shout: "It is a lie! Faust wins! The king and the knight have another move!" . . .THE KING AND THE KNIGHT HAVE ANOTHER MOVE. (6)

St. Paul tells us that we are more than conquerors through Christ Jesus. Don't you think that's what that artist is trying to tell us? There is always one more move. And the King and the Knight hold the key. No matter how life boxes us in and grinds us down--nothing can separate us from God's love. Even death itself cannot hold us captive. Christ gives us the victory. Now I know there is someone here today who needs to hear that good news. You might be at the end of your rope, and you think you can't hold on any longer. It feels like the game is over. But here is Christ's word to you: "The game is not over. You still have another move."

• In 1949 John Currier was sentenced to life in prison. Currier, who could not read or write, was later transferred from prison and paroled to work for a wealthy farmer. In 1968, Currier's sentence was ended, and the records in the Department of Corrections show that a letter was written to the convict and to the farmer, but somehow it never got to them. Currier never even knew that the letter existed. A year went by, then another, and another. Ten years after Currier's sentence had ended the farmer passed away, but Currier kept working, serving out his time. He was only given a little money for personal needs--$5 a week at first. He slept in a drafty trailer, and he took baths in a horse trough with a garden hose. Life held little joy and no promise for him. But one day a state parole officer finally learned of Currier's plight and told him about the missing letter. He had lost more than ten years of his life because he failed to get the message that he had been freed.

Perhaps someone here today has not yet experienced the freedom that Christ can give. His message has not been lost either, it is right here. Life does make sense in Christ. God can be experienced in Christ. And life and death can be conquered in Christ.

"Everyone is searching for you. . ." said the disciples to Jesus. And it was more true than they knew. He is the answer to every man's, every woman's, every young person's deepest need.

References

(1) Robert W. Youngs, WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A CHRISTIAN, (New York: Farrar, Straus & Cudahy, 1960).

(2) The Reverend David Rogne.

(3) Dr. Earnest A. Fitzgerald, GOD WRITES WITH CROOKED LINES, (New York: Atheneum, 1981).

(4) Rollo May, MAN'S SEARCH FOR HIMSELF, (New York: W. W. Norton and Co. 1953).

(5) Malcolm Muggeridge, JESUS REDISCOVERED, (New York: Doubleday, 1969).

(6) Elizabeth Achtemeir, CREATIVE PREACHING, (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1980).

(Reprinted with permission from Vital Faith for Challenging Times, by King Duncan. This resource, as well as many others, is available at a discount through the Homiletic Resource Center.)