Notice as you read this section the number of times Jesus teaches. Mark's gospel is the action gospel and yet, it seems, the number one action of Jesus is seeing Him teach. Jesus reveals God by His words. Hold that thought for a moment.
In chapter 9 Jesus is transformed before Peter, James, and John and then tells them not to tell anyone what they have seen until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. They had not yet accepted that Jesus would die, much less rise from the dead. So what was Jesus teaching them? Jesus was teaching them not to trust what they see, but to trust what He says which will then give meaning to what they see. If Jesus says, "Wait until this... before you start talking about that..." then He is teaching us about how we will understand "this." Later in the chapter (9:31-37) Jesus is teaching them this same lesson again.
Work through this section and note the teachings of Jesus concerning Himself. What is the number one thing we need to know and learn? Our number one need is to know Him and to learn of Him. Back to that thought; Knowing God is the result of hearing, seeing, and obeying Jesus.
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Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Monday, February 7, 2011
Meditation on Mark 7:1-13
Mark 7:1 begins with a wonderful statement, "Now when the Pharisees gathered to Him with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem, they saw..." Here we have a group of the religious leaders gathering around Jesus, and others that had traveled a great distance to see something of Jesus. But the next statement tells all, "...they saw that some of His disciples ate with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed."
When they gathered around around Jesus instead of seeing Him all they could see were the unwashed hands of His disciples. Their rules and traditions had blocked their view of Jesus. The Lord goes on to describe how they had honored God with their lips but their hearts were far from Him. And how they had emptied the Word of God of power by their traditions. The same thing can happen to us today if we elevate our traditions and begin interpreting God's Word by our traditions rather than interpreting our traditions by God's Word.
Traditions are the applications of God's Word. They become sacred when a generation fails to apply God's Word and instead simply apply the last generation's application of God's Word. The Bible speaks to every generation and to every culture, if we have ears to hear what the Spirit is saying.
As we seek the Lord, and gather around Him, let's make sure there are no barriers and let's focus upon what God is saying from His Word to us. The power of God's Word will then be unleashed within our lives and will change, transform, direct, encourage, and redeem.
When they gathered around around Jesus instead of seeing Him all they could see were the unwashed hands of His disciples. Their rules and traditions had blocked their view of Jesus. The Lord goes on to describe how they had honored God with their lips but their hearts were far from Him. And how they had emptied the Word of God of power by their traditions. The same thing can happen to us today if we elevate our traditions and begin interpreting God's Word by our traditions rather than interpreting our traditions by God's Word.
Traditions are the applications of God's Word. They become sacred when a generation fails to apply God's Word and instead simply apply the last generation's application of God's Word. The Bible speaks to every generation and to every culture, if we have ears to hear what the Spirit is saying.
As we seek the Lord, and gather around Him, let's make sure there are no barriers and let's focus upon what God is saying from His Word to us. The power of God's Word will then be unleashed within our lives and will change, transform, direct, encourage, and redeem.
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