GOSPEL MEDITATION #183

Sower Parable, purpose of Parables, and Interpretation

Mark 4:1-20

1. Find a quiet place without distractions.
2. Be comfortably alert, still, and at peace.
3. Say the Lord’s Prayer. Sing or cant the Jesus Prayer.
4. Pray for family, friends, neighbors, and yourself.
5. Slowly and carefully read the passage of Scripture.
6. From memory, determine the central points.
7. 20 verses, 3 sections, The Sower Parable perhaps the most vital of all parables to be understood by followers of Jesus. The hearers are the Twelve but also a larger group of serious disciples.
8. Farming context, the sower’s seed would fall into 4 different circumstances: some on the path, some on rocky ground, some among weeds, but other seed sown on good soil.
9. In verse 8 a great promise is given – there will be fruit and this to be understood as a growing of the Kingdom of God.
10. The reason for parables may look back to Isaiah 6:9-10. For reasons that are most difficult to understand, hearers of the parables containing the truth of God yet do not experience forgiveness. There is no satisfactory resolution to this conundrum.
11. The interpretation of the parable now, and Jesus interprets only 3 of His parables., this one, the sower, but also the Parable of the Weeds (Matthew 13:36-43, and, as it is thought, the Parable of the Net (Matthew 13:47-50). All of these have to do with evangelism.
12. The path: of necessity seed, the Word, will fall on ears only momentarily and Satan rushes in (and in ways unexplained here) and takes away the message of the Gospel.
13. Rocky ground: at first there is joy but it is short lived since a genuine conversion, an inner working of the Holy Spirit, has not taken place. It does not take much for the Word to be rejected. Very common experience.
14. Thorny ground: This is more difficult and it is not clear whether a real conversion has taken place; commentators are divided. Bottom line – no fruit is borne and to me indicates no real conversion.
15. Good soil: Here is the promise to the Christian – there will be fruit, the Kingdom will grow, and the fruit varies from person to person.

GOSPEL MEDITATION # 182

Mark 3:23-35

Blasphemy Against the Holy Spirit & Jesus’ Mother & Brothers

1. Find a quiet place without distractions.
2. Be comfortably alert, still, and at peace.
3. Say the Lord’s Prayer. Sing or cant the Jesus Prayer.
4. Pray for family, friends, neighbors, and yourself.
5. Slowly and carefully read the passage of Scripture.
6. From memory, determine the central points.
7. Blasphemy—slanderous words spoken against a deity or religion.
8. In our passage Jesus properly reacted against a form of blasphemy. His miracles could not be covered up so a more stringent tack was required by Jesus’ enemies, in this case, attributing the miracles and casting out of demons to the power of Satan.
9. Jesus relies on common logic to counter the charge—the reality of it is indisputable.
10. There is a problem of another, more dreadful consequence of attributing the works of Jesus to Satan or Beelzebub, meaning the lord of the flies, a Canaanite evil demon. This blasphemy is the committing of an unforgiveable sin.
11. Most Biblical commentators think it means that believing and confessing that Jesus has an unclean or evil spirit means an utter and complete rejection of Jesus and thus His work on the cross.
12. We would all like to know more about this but the passage does not make a clear answer possible.
13. Jesus’ family, mother, brothers (4 of them) and many old manuscripts have “sisters” as well, are still without understanding of the mission of Jesus and only see that He is acting strangely and not caring for His physical needs. They literally think He has lost His mind.
14. When informed that His family would like to see them, He apparently ignores them. At least we are not told that He went out to them or even that on some other occasion, He spoke with them and calmed their fears.
15. Jesus uses the incident to teach something that is nothing less than incredible: His family consists of those who follow Him.
16. These people would be His immediate disciples whom He had just recently called to be with Him.
17. To believe in and follow Jesus is be become a member of His family.

GOSPEL MEDITATION #180

Mark 3:1-12

A Man with a Withered Hand and

A Great Crowd Follows Jesus

1. Find a quiet place without distractions.
2. Be comfortably alert, still, and at peace.
3. Say the Lord’s Prayer. Sing or cant the Jesus Prayer.
4. Pray for family, friends, neighbors, and yourself.
5. Slowly and carefully read the passage of Scripture.
6. From memory, determine the central points.
7. A Sabbath, which for pious Jews meant no work on that day. Even healing would have been considered work.
8. Was the man a ‘plant’? There were enemies of Jesus

there who wanted to accuse Him.

9. Jesus was angry, and grieved, at the hard heartedness of

those who would accuse Him. A righteous anger?

10. The healing produced a deadly, unrighteous anger in

Jesus’ enemies and they, the Pharisees and Herodians,

who would ordinarily have been at odds with each other,

now unite against Jesus and want to destroy (kill) Him.

11. In sharp contrast, large crowds are attracted to Jesus.

These came from all over that part of the world save

Samaria, where there was a rival religious system.

12. Jesus, perhaps sensing the danger from the large throng,

had a small boat ready for Him. Likely He pushed off a

little from the shore and taught from there.

13. There were healings and demons cast out. The demons

were the ones who knew who Jesus was, incredibly, and

He refuse their testimony. What a turn of events.

GOSPEL MEDITATION # 192

The Gospel of Mark #23

Jesus walks of the Water and

Jesus Heals the Sick in Gennesaret

1. Find a quiet place, alone and apart from distractions.
2. Be comfortably alert, still and at peace.
3. Say the Lord’s Prayer. Sing or cant the Jesus Prayer

4          Pray for family, friends, neighbors, and yourself.

5. Slowly and carefully read the passage of Scripture.
6. Reread it. From memory, determine the central points.
7. Jesus needed to create distance between Himself and the Twelve. There was a danger into being forced to declare His Messiahship following the great miracle.
8. The disciple may have wondered why they had been sent away, but then between 3 and 6am there came Jesus walking on the water.
9. In 1 Corinthians 12 4-11, we find one of Holy Spirit gifts is miracles, and the feeding and the walking fit.
10. He would have passed by except for the invitation; seems Jesus waits for the invitation with us too.
11. A ghost, a “phantasma” from the Greek; the disciples had plenty of cultural and superstitious baggage yet.
12. Not really grasping the 5000 fed, they were again astounded when the wind ceased.
13. Gennesaret, a very fertile valley 1 and ½ miles west of the sea of Galilee that stretched south 3 and ½ miles—again the crowds caught up with the Jesus and the twelve, which is understandable given the incredible miracles they had witnessed—and again, no time to rest and teach.

14.       We are desperate when something touches our body; rarely are we troubled when the illness has to do with the heart. And when so, the troubling is a gift of the Holy Spirit. This must be the healing we seek from

GOSPEL MEDITATION # 179

Mark 2: 23-28

Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath

1. Find a quiet place without distractions.
2. Be comfortably alert, still, and at peace.
3. Say the Lord’s Prayer. Sing or cant the Jesus Prayer.
4. Pray for family, friends, neighbors, and yourself.
5. Slowly and carefully read the passage of Scripture.
6. From memory, determine the central points.
7. Sabbath, the 7^th day, God rested or ceased His creating work. Rules abounded around it and created impossible situation for common people.
8. The legalists must have been tracking Jesus and accused Him of breaking Sabbath law when He and His disciples ‘gleaned’ food from the fields that were purposefully left for the poor.
9. The Pharisees did not care if the people went hungry; their concern was breaking the Sabbath law and gleaning of the wheat was considered work.
10. Religious people love law keeping; makes us feel good while ignoring heart felt worship and love for God and others.
11. And we are all tending to this; faith and love are so much more intangible. Rules and more rules is the way of the world.
12. Jesus was not promoting lawlessness; rather His intent was to teach mercy and human kindness.
13. David and his followers were desperately hungry when they came across the old Tabernacle and there on the table was the Bread of the Presence. 2 rows, each loaves per row, directed in the Torah to be baked each Sabbath, new replacing the old.
14. The old six would be thrown out and David and his men seized 6 loaves and ate them. The story in 1 Samuel 21 was know to all. Sabbath laws were heartless and damaging to humans.
15. Jesus used the historical example as if it were intended to be prophetic and dramatized the fact that He was in fact Lord of the Sabbath.

GOSPEL MEDITATION #177

Mark 2:13-17 Jesus Calls Levi

1. Find a quiet place without distractions.
2. Be comfortably alert, still, and at peace.
3. Say the Lord’s Prayer. Sing or cant the Jesus Prayer.
4. Pray for family, friends, neighbors, and yourself.
5. Slowly and carefully read the passage of Scripture.
6. From memory, determine the central points.
7. Crowds are hearing Jesus teaching, here by the Sea of Galilee, likely near to Capernaum.
8. Levi, otherwise known as Matthew which is likely a nickname and means “gift of Yahweh”.
9. “Son of Alphaeus” – his father’s name is Alphaeus –James, another disciple, also had a father named Alphaeus. (see Matthew 10:3) Matthew and James not brothers though, or so it is thought by most scholars.
10. Tax booth, at Capernaum, which was one of 3 main tax collecting stations set up by the Romans to tax traders heading to and from Egypt. The others being at Jericho and Caesarea. Levi would be a sub-contractor and would have employees present to act as security.
11. “Follow me” – a command and Levi obeyed, instantly.
12. Levi threw a big party and his friends and associates

showed up – a bunch of sinners despised by Pharisees.

13. The blaming question, “why” is on the lips of the legalists.

After the healing of the paralytic, the religious authorities

would be looking for ammunition to show that Jesus is not

reputable.

14. Note that Jesus had no problem with being in, and eating

with, the very lowest of the low.

15. Jesus’ response was that He was in fact doing what He

came to do – to call sinners to Himself.

16. Jesus only calls sinners to Himself. They alone will seek

forgiveness. Those, clothed in their own righteousness, will

never seek Jesus.

17. A sinner – the first spiritual truth we learn.

GOSPEL MEDITATION #176

The Gospel of Mark

Jesus heals a Paralytic — Mark 2:1-12

1. Find a quiet place without distractions.
2. Be comfortably alert, still, and at peace.
3. Say the Lord’s Prayer. Sing or cant the Jesus Prayer
4. Pray for family, friends, neighbors, and yourself.
5. Slowly and carefully read the passage of Scripture.
6. Reread it. From memory, determine the central points.
7. Jesus at home, question is, His or Peter’s.
8. Whenever healing is reported, crowds gather.
9. Jesus was preaching, not healing however.
10. Four guys had a dear friend they wanted to bring to Jesus.
11. With great boldness they did something unusual, they took apart a roof and lowered their friend down to Jesus.
12. Jesus’ response: “My son, your sins are forgiven.” Let it be noted that the Greek simply has teknon meaning child.
13. Scribes, doctors of the Law, saw Jesus’ statement as blasphemy as they knew only God can forgive sin, this only by means of a proper sacrifice.
14. Jesus knew what was in their hearts, possibly by means of the charismatic gift of knowledge. (see 1 Cor. 12:8)
15. Jesus wanted the scribes to know that what He said was true by healing the paralytic completely.
16. To bring the point home, He asked which was easier – to forgive or heal. Of course, the idea is, well it is fine to forgive sins but that was an empty gesture at minimum.
17. The man who could not walk did and also lugged his mattress home with him — no other proof needed.
18. For sure, no one had ever seen anything like it. The point, the lesson, Jesus had in mind was that He was far more than a healer, He had authority, there and then, to forgive sin.

GOSPEL MEDITATION # 174

Mark 1:21-34

Jesus heals a man with an unclean spirit &

Jesus heals many

1. Find a quiet place, alone and apart from distractions.
2. Be comfortably alert, still and at peace.
3. Say the Lord’s Prayer. Sing or cant the Jesus Prayer
4. Pray for family, friends, neighbors, and yourself.
5. Slowly and carefully read the passages of Scripture.
6. Reread them. From memory, determine the central points.
7. Jesus teaching in a synagogue in Capernaum, may indicated that Jesus was somewhat known. It has been suggested that Jesus had relocated to that city.
8. Jesus’ presence stirred up a demon in a man who was ‘demonized’. The demon(s) knew Jesus was the “Holy One of God” in startling contrast to anyone else present.
9. Jesus told “them” to be silent and come out of the demonized man.
10. It was not neat and clean; there was a commotion and loud screaming from the man as the demons fought their exit.
11. This ‘exorcism’ was far different than anything the observers had experienced before. Here was someone with authority. And Jesus’s fame spread.
12. Leaving the synagogue He entered the home of the brothers Peter and Andrew, which must have been less than a Sabbath’s walk away from the synagogue. James and John were also present, and the four constituted all of Jesus’ disciples at that point.
13. Peter’s mother was ill, she had a fever, and the family told Jesus about it. He took her by the hand, lifted her up, and the fever left her – she was healed. She was strong enough, immediately, that she commenced to serve them.
14. The word spread, about both the expelling of demons and the healing, so that people needing help descended upon Jesus at Peter’s family home.