Manuscript of my sermon at Brooks Avenue Church, Raleigh, NC; preached April 28, 2024.

If you’d like to watch it, there’s a video link below.

Let’s talk about the Gospel

Our text today is Mark 1:29-31. Since Easter, our Minister of the Word, Bryan Moss, has been leading us through the Gospel of Mark in a series called: I’ve Got the Good News.

Not just I’ve got good news; but I’ve got the Good News.

Because Gospel means good news; and there’s only one Gospel that saves us—and that’s the Good News about Jesus Christ.

Let’s talk about this word, Gospel.

In common, secular use, it was a report of victory from the battlefield.

For example, Psalm 68:11-12: a great company of women brought the good news: ‘The kings of the armies flee — they flee!’ She who stays at home divides the spoil (Psalm 68:11-12).

I love that, don’t you? The women are proclaiming the victory of their king. The enemies are running away. And these women—who didn’t see combat themselves—are going to share in the spoils of victory.

Now, even in the Old Testament, they were using this word—Gospel; good news—to speak of the Lord’s victory. Here’s Isaiah 40:911: herald of good news, raise your voice loudly. Herald of good news could also be translated as: Preacher of the Gospel.

Herald of good news, raise your voice loudly. Raise it, do not be afraid! And what is the Gospel preacher supposed to proclaim aloud?

Say to the cities of Judah, “Here is your God!” See, the Lord God comes with strength, and his power establishes his rule. His wages are with him, and his reward accompanies him (Isaiah 40:9-10).

The Gospel preacher must herald the glad tidings of Christ’s victory.

The Lord is victorious, He reigns, and He’s bringing a reward for His people. He’s going to give those who believe in Him a share in the spoils of His victory.

So Mark has titled his book: The beginning of the gospel—or the Good News—of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

It’s only the beginning of the Good News because it’s still unfolding, you see. Our Lord has yet to return with our eternal reward.

So, that’s the context in which we need to read everything in Mark’s Gospel, including our passage today—Mark 1:29-31.

Two weeks ago, we heard about how Jesus taught at the synagogue on the Sabbath, and cast a demon out of a man there. Our passage today picks up immediately from there.

As soon as they left the synagogue, they went into Simon and Andrew’s house with James and John. Simon’s mother-in-law was lying in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once. So he went to her, took her by the hand, and raised her up. The fever left her, and she began to serve them.

Mark 1:29-31 CSB

The Word of God for the people of God.

Mark’s Gospel is the victory report of Jesus. He’s showing us even in the fine details, like Jesus healing Simon Peter’s mother-in-law from a fever.

Mark is showing us that our Lord has come from heaven in the flesh to do battle battle with our enemies: Satan and his demonic army of darkness; the guilt and power of sin; and the gaping maw of Death and Hell.

He has gone to battle against them and has defeated them all, for us.

That’s the Good News Mark is giving us in his Gospel story. He is showing us, in vivid detail—full-color and high definition—the victory of our Lord.

Mark shows us that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God—and indeed, God the Son, in the flesh—by telling us what He does.

He doesn’t have Jesus going around declaring: Hey y’all, I’m the Son of God!

Instead, Mark shows us Jesus having the power to call as God calls—He tells people to follow Him, and they just do.

He teaches with authority, and people are amazed.

He tells storms to be still, and they stop.

He tells demons and diseases to go away—and they do.

So Mark doesn’t tell us: Here’s Jesus. He’s the Christ, He’s God-in-the-flesh, like Matthew or John do. He shows us, by telling us Jesus’ mighty deeds.

Peter’s mother-in-law was sick

So again—Jesus has just performed an exorcism in the synagogue, and now he’s going home with His disciples, Peter and Andrew.

His other two disciples—James and John—are also with them. And as soon as they walk into the house, somebody tells Jesus that Peter’s mother-in-law is in bed with a fever.

Now, here’s what you need to know to picture the scene.

We know Peter had a wife, because his mother-in-law is living with them. Peter’s brother Andrew is also living there.

So this is like a family house. Probably the mother-in-law was a widow, that’s why she lives with them. And perhaps Andrew wasn’t married yet, so he’s living with his older brother.

Now, here come three houseguests: Jesus, James, and John.

Now you’ve got a new wave band from the eighties: Crowded House.

And there’s, first—there’s a practical situation, because now you have three extra dudes in the house. Who’s going to help cook and clean, in terms of showing hospitality?

It’s not just that they’re down a person. Okay, Peter’s wife is going to need to look after mom, too.

But what’s extra poignant here, is that a fever can be dangerous—even deadly—for an older person, like Peter’s mother-in-law.

I mean, that’s a lesson we learned painfully during COVID, right? Like, as bad as it was on you, it might kill grandma. You know?

So, there’s this cramped house, and everyone is anxious because Mama’s real sick.

So that’s where the battle lines really are in our text today. Remember: Mark’s giving us a blow-by-blow victory report. Jesus is winning. That’s how you need to read every passage on every page.

Even in these seemingly mundane details—Mama’s down with a fever—there’s a cosmic drama playing out. That’s our first Write-this-in-the-margin-of-your Bible moment.

Jesus has come to declare war on Satan, sin, and death.

In the synagogue, He began to confront the servants of Satan—the demons.

Now, at Peter’s house, He starts to take on the scourges of Satan—diseases.

This Sabbath, Jesus put the powers of Hell on notice: He has come to dismantle the Devil’s dark dominion.

I keep mentioning that because I want you to remember this was all the same day. The Lord rolled up and gave the Devil two black eyes that Sabbath.

Our fatal sin-sickness

So now, let’s make this personal, okay? Let’s bring this story where we live.

This isn’t going to be one of those health and healing sermons, okay?

I’m not up here to tell you to name it and claim it; Jesus is going to cure your fits and warts and make childbirth a pleasure.

Now, listen—the Bible absolutely says, He heals all your diseases (Psalm 103:3). But that the Lord heals all our diseases without distinction; not without exception.

What I mean is, the same God heals your cold sores and your cancer.

So if you’ve been healed from anything, you better give glory to God.

Don’t just say: The doctor cured it; or, The medicine cured it; or, My immune system knocked it out; or, I healed myself with diet and exercise.

Well, who gave the doctors their skill? Who gave us the plants and minerals they make medicines out of? For that matter—who created your immune system?

Now listen—sure enough, give due credit to the doctors and the surgeons. Thank God for modern medicine.

But understand this: absolutely every good and perfect gift is from above (James 1:17). But God doesn’t usually just hand them to us personally, you know?

Like—think about how He feeds you. He hasn’t rained down manna from heaven in a good long while. Right?

God feeds you through the sun and the rain; and the regular rhythms of seed time and harvest; and the work of the farmer and the truck driver and the grocer.

He gives you your daily bread through the shaky hands of feeble sinners just like you. And that’s often how He brings us healing, too.

You thank God for the food you bought at Waffle House; so you better also give Him the glory for the penicillin that got rid of your strep throat.

Anyway—like I said—God heals every disease without distinction; not without exception.

Some things aren’t going to be healed this side of glory.

But like the New Testament scholar D.A. Carson is fond of saying: I’m not suffering from anything that a good resurrection won’t fix.

But listen—back to our passage, and how it touches us.

Here’s where it comes and sits down with us in our own living rooms; yea, verily—it embraces us all.

You see, every one of us is—or has been—in a much graver condition than Peter’s mother-in-law.

The fever she had contracted might have been deadly. We’ll never know, because the Lord healed her before it got that dire. You see?

But every one of us has contracted a hereditary illness that is one hundred percent fatal.

That terminal illness is our sin, and it always leads to death and Hell, if it’s allowed to run its course.

Brother Paul put it like this, Romans 5:12: sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, in this way death spread to all people, because all sinned.

Sin is fundamentally a disease of the heart—that is, our intellect, our emotions, our desires and our wills.

Scripture puts it like this. Jeremiah 17:9-10: The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?

It’s not talking about some hypothetical diseased heart. It’s talking about your heart and mine.

And by nature our hearts are desperately sick. Beyond human cure. So depraved that we cannot even fathom the depths of our sickness.

Way, way back, near the dawn of time, that old Serpent Satan sunk his fangs into the hearts of our first parents, Adam and Eve.

So there’s this sin disease, this bent towards rebellion, that’s endemic to the human race. God declares that everything [we] think or imagine is bent toward evil from childhood (Genesis 8:21).

We—listen y’all—we come into life already snakebit. And that old Serpent’s venom is like a fire in our bones that makes us downright delirious. So that we forget our Creator. So that our natural inclination is to hate God and our neighbor.

St. Paul says it this way, in Titus 3:3. That we have all been foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.

Here’s your second, Write-this-in-the margin moment: Peter’s mother-in-law’s sickness was nothing compared to our sin-sickness.

Our danger is dire compared to hers. Going back to Jeremiah 17. After telling us how desperately depraved our hearts are, God declares: “I the Lord search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.”

Have you ever heard someone say, Oh, I don’t need religion. God knows my heart?

God knows your heart, alright. Sees it better than you do. And He says it’s full of corruption and darkness and death.

The wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23). The soul that sinneth, it shall die (Ezekiel 18:21). Okay—that’s all of us.

God says your heart is full of violence and deceit, selfishness and smugness. And He may hate the smugness worst of all.

Listen, Peter’s mother-in-law was laid up in bed. She wasn’t able to get up and make herself better.

Neither are you. Ephesians 2 says we all inherit this same fault, we are by nature—not nurture—children deserving of wrath, dead in our sins and transgressions.

You don’t get any more helpless than dead.

So imagine yourself as that old woman, lying in bed with a high fever, helpless and delirious. Put yourself in her sick bed.

‘Cause you’re sure not Jesus in this story.

Once healed, she began to serve

So, they bring Jesus to her sickbed. And it says, v31: he went to her, took her by the hand, and raised her up.

And immediately: The fever left her.

Notice there weren’t any incantations or magic ceremonies.

Peter’s mother-in-law didn’t get slain in the Spirit.

Jesus didn’t tell her to say a special prayer, or sow a seed of faith by sending Him her social security.

He didn’t sell her an anointed miracle handkerchief.

Jesus took her by the hand and raised her up. That’s it.

She was too sick to get out of bed. But Jesus walks right into the room, lifts her up out of bed, and she’s no longer sick. The fever is gone.

So here’s your third, Write this in the margins moment: The power of salvation is in Christ’s hands alone. Like it says in Psalm 3:8: Salvation belongs to the Lord.

After all, what did Peter’s mother-in-law contribute to her own healing? Nothing but the fever that made it necessary!

And notice that the healing is immediate and total.

Think about that. When you’re down with a fever, you don’t just pop back up and start working. You gradually regain your strength.

But it says, all at once, The fever left her, and she began to serve them.

There was no lingering weakness. No wobbly knees. No long COVID. She just got up and started pouring sweet tea for everybody.

And again, remember: all this happened on the Sabbath.

Sabbath is rest.

Not just rest from work, but rest from burdens and anxiety.

By casting out demons and healing diseases, Christ is taking away pain and fear, and replacing them with hope and joy. He is restoring these people, making them who God meant them to be.

This is what He did for Peter’s mother-in-law on that Sabbath.

Earlier that day, He had released a man in the synagogue from a demon. Now He’s set this woman free from a disease.

When Jesus healed her, it was towards the end of the Sabbath day. But for her—listen—a new kind of Sabbath was dawning.

He had set her free from an illness that was keeping her in bed, unable to fulfill her vocation.

Sabbath was rooted in two realities. Exodus 20:11 grounds the Sabbath in the creation. God worked for six days, then rested on the Sabbath.

Humans, made in God’s image, are called to join Him in that rest. To cease from our own labors, and to rest in His finished work.

But Deuteronomy 5:15 connects the Sabbath to God rescuing His people from slavery in Egypt. They had toiled for generations under a cruel tyrant. God set them free—rescued them, brought them through the Red Sea, crushed their enemies—all so they could know rest.

And on this Sabbath, Jesus set that woman free from the illness that kept her confined to her bed.

He plucked her out of bed with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm.

He rescued her from her sick bed so she could do what God created humans to do, and that’s take dominion over their surroundings. And that’s just what she did. She took dominion over dinner preparations.

Now, notice it says she began to serve Jesus and His disciples.

That’s the second time this verb—to serve—has been used in Mark chapter 1. The first was back in v13. When Jesus was in the wilderness for forty days, battling the devil, it says and the angels were serving Him.

This was an acknowledgment of His Lordship. The angels were serving Jesus because He is their Lord. Likewise, Peter’s mother-in-law recognized Christ’s Lordship by serving Him, the same way the angels had.

Above all, it was an act of gratitude. She expressed her thankfulness to the One who healed her—who got her up and well again—by serving Him, and serving His disciples, who were with Him.

I kind of like to imagine that dinner was extra savory that night, because she seasoned it with her thanksgiving to the Lord.

You have also been saved to serve

So here’s the good news today, that you can take home with you, into your own living room. This same Jesus who saved Peter’s mother-in-law from her fever—He alone can cool and cure the fires of sin and hell in your soul.

And when He heals you—when He saves you from this deadly fever—He’s setting you free to serve Him, and to be a blessing to others.

That’s the fourth and final note for the margins of your Bibles: Jesus heals us so we can serve Him.

Now, maybe somebody here is thinking: No, not me. I can’t serve the Lord. I don’t have anything to offer but my sin and misery. I’m just a rusty bucket of weakness and failure.

Listen here: That woman didn’t have anything to offer Jesus but a fever. And she couldn’t even bring her fever to Him, could she? He had to come to her and take her fever away.

Don’t worry right now about what you think you can or can’t do. Look at Him!

Look at Him, and listen to this. Romans 8:3-4.

Picture yourself lying helpless in that sick bed, and He’s taking your feeble hand in His mighty hands, and He’s lifting you up.

It says: For what the law could not do since it was weakened by the flesh, God did. In other words, what you couldn’t do by your best efforts, by your good intentions, by all your plotting and scheming—God has done it for you in Christ.

He’s made a way to rescue you out of this fever dream you’ve been living in, with Satan’s fangs sunk deep in your heel, and his venom pumping in your heart.

In Christ, God has broken that old serpent’s teeth and can draw that venom of wretched selfishness and complacency out of you.

Listen—can’t you feel Jesus’ mighty hand closing around yours, His arm supporting you as He lifts you out of this bed you made in Hell?

It says God condemned sin in the flesh by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh as a sin offering. God the Son has offered His own perfect life in place of yours.

He has suffered in His own body the full pain and sorrow of that old Serpent’s venom. And that includes God’s fury at the Serpent and his poison.

Jesus—listen!—went down into a shameful death, so that you might have a glorious life.

Listen to this now, and feel Him pulling you off your sick bed, and standing you up straight. He did all this in order that the law’s requirement would be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

He takes off our sick clothes, and covers us with His own perfection. He puts His own Holy Spirit in us, where Satan’s venom had been pumping through our hearts.

And by His Spirit in us, He makes us able, not only to stand firm, but to walk according to His will. For it is God who is working in you both to will and to work according to his good purpose (Philippians 2:13).

So don’t talk yourself into staying in that sick bed that’s dangling precariously over the fires of Hell. It’s not about what you can do or can’t do. It’s what He can and will do in you, and for you, and through you.

The Lord sets us free from the guilt and the shame and the power of sin; and from the fear of death, so that we might live in Him, and for Him.

So that in joy and gratitude, we rise up to love Him and to serve one another.

One of my favorite passages in the whole Bible preaches this so beautifully. Luke 1:74-75: We have been rescued from our enemies—those enemies are Satan, sin, and death—so we can serve God without fear, in holiness and righteousness for as long as we live.

Listen—all y’all, because the Gospel is for Christians too—Jesus has set you free to serve God without fear. You don’t need to fear man, ‘cause the worst he can do is send you to heaven quicker.

And you don’t have to be afraid of God not accepting your service—nitpicking it, finding fault with it, saying: That’s not enough and it’s not good enough. Listen, in Christ, God accepts what you do in faith—imperfect and incomplete as it is—as holy and righteous. Because you did it in Christ, and He is holy and righteous enough to cover all your faults.

So believer—don’t let the Devil talk you into flinging yourself back onto your sickbed. The same Jesus who pulled you up out of that bed will hold you up.

His Holy Spirit will testify with your spirit that you are indeed God’s beloved daughter or son, and a fellow heir with Christ.

The Gospel call, the Good News about Christ, has its own power in it, to make us able to believe it and obey. It makes you want to get out of that sickbed of sin and death; and to be able to get up and go.

So today, if you are feeling the hand of Christ—that hand that bled for you, and will hold you fast and support you all the days of your life; if you feel that hand taking your hand, come on.

Feel His strong arm supporting you. He will bear you up. He will carry you here, and we will receive your confession. And He will bring you to the waters of baptism, and claim you as His own there—and so will the Father and the Holy Spirit.

Today is the day of salvation. Jesus has reached down from on high to pull you out of your sickbed of sin and sorrow. And He will give you His own Holy Spirit, and put a new heart in you, so that you are fit to serve Him.