MARK: Jesus #Unfiltered

Recently, we have learned a lot about isolation. Being cut off from human contact is incredibly hard! However, if you had leprosy in the first century your experience would have been even worse. There was no Netflix to binge, no church to watch on a livestream, and no phone calls. You would have been isolated with other lepers, left completely alone, you would be ceremonially unclean, and anyone who touched you was at great risk of catching the disease and were considered unclean. Not only were you physically isolated, but you would have been considered dangerous. So there’s no surprise that a person with leprosy would have done anything to be clean.

In this passage today, a man with leprosy begs Jesus that if he is willing, Jesus can make him clean. He approaches Jesus knowing that all Jesus has to do is be willing. He believes that Jesus has the ability to do this! Jesus’ response was to be full of compassion (the NIV here goes with ‘indignant’ but with the footnote that ‘many manuscripts have ‘compassion’). Not only that, but he risks his own infection, he risks becoming ceremonially unclean and he reaches out his hand and touches the man! Remember, you aren’t supposed to touch or even go near a person with leprosy! However, Jesus has deep compassion, and the man was completely, fully healed.

Now why Jesus tells this man not to tell anyone we will unpack later on but for now, it goes along with his priority to preach. He doesn’t want to just be seen as a miracle worker performing tricks, but the Son of God come to teach and redeem the world. Here again, we see glimpses of the Kingdom of God, where the outcasts of society are welcomed in, the sick healed, and where grace and compassion know no boundaries. MC

Questions

Prayer

Lord God, thank you that you are a God of deep compassion and abounding in love. Give us the same mind of Jesus, that others may see our compassion for all in society and see you at work. In Jesus Name, Amen.

I’m a fairly introverted person. I love people, and I love being around people but I find it fairly tiring! So, after a Sunday morning, you’ll probably find me having an afternoon nap on my couch after a fairly social morning, getting re-energised for the 6PM service. However, in today’s passage, we would be wrong to think that Jesus is retreating because he is ‘peopled out’ like I sometimes am, but in the quiet time of the morning, he goes out specifically to pray. This is only one sentence in the whole book but it is very significant! If Jesus makes quiet time and prayer a priority in his life and he is the Son of God, why should we be any different in our priorities?

Meanwhile, the disciples are wandering around looking for Jesus and when they find him, they tell him that everyone is looking for him! Again, this is probably another exaggeration, I’m not sure that every person was looking for Jesus but you can almost hear the urgency in their words. They may have wanted Jesus to keep on healing, to take this show on the road, to get even more followers! However, Jesus response isn’t what they are expecting.

Jesus tells them that they are going to go somewhere else in order that he will be able to preach. That is the reason that Jesus came - to preach. The miracles may be great in gathering popularity, but the preaching is fundamental in making disciples and is the core of Jesus’ mission on earth. It would be a great mistake of us to just look at Jesus’ life and what he did and not actually listen to his words and put them into practice. MC

Questions

Prayer

Lord God, we are sorry for when we take the privilege of prayer and time with you for granted. Please help us to make this and hearing your word a priority in our lives, that we may grow as disciples of you in every way. Amen.

Again, immediately we are thrown into another scene. Jesus left the synagogue and went to the house of Simon and Andrew but Simon’s mother-in-law was ill. She was lying in bed with a fever. Having seen Jesus cast out the demon just earlier in the day, they may have thought that since Jesus could do that, perhaps he could heal the woman. So, immediately they told him. Jesus simply approaches the woman, helps her up, and she is healed. To prove that it was full healing and not just partial, Mark records that she was able to serve the disciples and Jesus.

There are no words recorded, no ritual that had to be done, no real process, just the authority of Jesus at work. We’ve seen that he has authority to teach, to cast out demons, and now the authority to heal sickness. In the following verses we see this even more.

Word must have gotten out about Jesus and who he is because after dark, the citizens of Capernaum come out in numbers. Mark tells us that they bring all the sick and demon-possessed and that the whole town was gathered at the door of this house! Can you imagine just how many people were there? Now, Mark is probably exaggerating here in order to let us know that there were a lot of people who Jesus healed and he does this so that we can have no doubt that Jesus’ authority was absolute. It wasn’t like Jesus had a small amount of ‘power’ that he could only dish out here and there, no. Jesus has complete and ultimate authority over sickness and demons. He has compassion on and healed many people with various diseases. Jesus is the great physician who has the will and the ability to heal the sick and drive out all that is evil. And again, we are given a glimpse of what the Kingdom of God is like - where there will be no evil, no pain, no suffering, but worshipping Jesus the King. MC

Questions

Prayer

Heavenly Father, thank you for sending us Jesus. Please help us not to reject your authority but to welcome it, knowing that you are loving, compassionate, and are lord of all. Amen.

Back in school I used to be a bit of a bookworm and I loved action packed novels. They would draw me in and then I was stuck in them because they were so quickly paced. The story moved from one thing to another so quickly that I couldn’t put them down! This is what Mark is like in these opening chapters. We are propelled from one scene into another, getting different plot lines, different characters, and also seeing who Jesus is gradually revealed throughout the book. One of the greek words Mark uses to do this is ‘euthus’ which simply means ‘immediately’ and it is used 12 times in the first chapter alone! In today’s passage we are told that they went to Capernaum and immediately they went into the synagogue and Jesus began to teach.

Jesus’ teaching caused quite a stir in the synagogue because he taught differently to all the teachers before. The scribes and the teachers of the law taught simply by quoting other rabbis and not by their own authority. However, Jesus comes into the synagogue and teaches with his own authority and people were amazed. Although it wasn’t just people who were amazed, but a man with an impure spirit was stirred and cries out. What is amazing and almost ironic is that what he cries out is true. Jesus has come to defeat sin, death, and all that is evil, and he is the Holy One of God! But Jesus commands the spirit to be silent and come out of the man. The result? The spirit came out of the man and became silent.

In these few verses we are given an awesome picture of who Jesus is. He has authority to teach, and he has authority over the impure spirits. We also are given glimpses of the kingdom breaking into the world. Jesus’ teaching is made known, and all that is evil is being driven out. MC

Questions

Prayer

Heavenly Father, thank you for the authority of Jesus, for his teaching, and for his authority over evil. Thank you that you are ultimately in control and that you have the final say. Help us to recognise this more and more in our lives. Amen.

Reflection

Yesterday we landed on seeing how being part of the kingdom means repenting and giving our lives completely over to King Jesus. Today, we see four men doing exactly that! We aren’t given any background to who these men are. We aren’t told that they had heard Jesus preach yet. We aren’t even told about their beliefs at this time! But we are told exactly what they did. They left everything to follow Jesus.

Jesus was walking beside the lake and saw two men fishing. There wasn’t a great inspiring speech and there wasn’t any music playing, but he simply says, ‘Come, follow me.’ It can be easy to overcomplicate Christianity and our discipleship, but this is the crux and the heart of our relationship with God. Follow Jesus. Follow Jesus with all that we are and all that we have, and he will completely transform our lives. Jesus tells Simon and Andrew that he will make them fish for people. This is another way of saying that he will transform their lives and their purpose of their lives.

They were once fishing for fish, providing temporary food, temporary relief from hunger, and keeping people going in their temporary lives. However, Jesus is going to send them to fish for people and bring them to him. This will be eternal food, eternal relief from hunger, and Jesus will provide eternal life. Their response? They left everything they had and followed him, as did James and John. They turned their lives from their own livelihood to live for King Jesus. They left all that they had behind for Jesus. Our call is to do the same and be part of Jesus’ everlasting, never ending Kingdom. Jesus has called us to repent and believe, he has made a way to the Father and brings in a transformed life now and everlasting life to come. MC

Questions

Prayer

Lord God, thank you for the model of the disciples in following Jesus. Help us not to overcomplicate our relationship with you but to follow you with all that we are and all that we have. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

As is typical of Mark, the scene shifts suddenly in today’s passage. John the Baptist has been put in prison, and we’ll revisit him later on, and now Jesus begins his ministry. He is now in the spotlight and this week we will see an almost ‘prelude’ to the rest of the Gospel. What we see Jesus say and do, we will see him do in the rest of the book.

Firstly, he comes proclaiming or preaching the good news of God. The good news that we can be with God and worship him for eternity in his presence, through Jesus. It is great news and according to Jesus, that time is now here. Other translations have this verse as ‘the time has been fulfilled’. The prophesies, the hopes and dreams of a messiah of the Israelites, the expectation the God would save his people are all being fulfilled in the coming of Jesus - the coming of the king bringing in his kingdom.

We’ll see this week what the signs of the Kingdom of God are but the Kingdom is simply where, God’s people, are in God’s place, under God’s rule. Where God is ruling is where the Kingdom is and through Jesus, that kingdom is drawing near. The effects of it will be seen, touched, and heard, however, it won’t find its full culmination until Jesus comes again. Until then, we can catch glimpses of the Kingdom, of God at work through the rest of the gospels and in our very own lives.

But how can we be part of the Kingdom? By repenting and believing. Jesus’ first words recorded by Mark are fundamental. To be under God’s rule, we have to deny ourselves of our own rule, turn away from it, repent and turn to living under God’s rule and believe the good news of the Gospel, not just in an intellectual way but with our whole entire lives, giving everything over to Jesus. MC

Questions

Prayer

Heavenly Father, thank you for sending Jesus and thank you for the great news of the Gospel. Help us to submit to your loving kingship and to live the whole of our lives in service of you. In Jesus’ name, Amen.