The apostle’s mission trip, Mark 6: 7-13, 30     

This passage marks a significant transition in the ministry of Jesus Christ.  He has been preaching the gospel of the kingdom for about 2 years now.  He has called twelve disciples to be with Him, to follow Him, to learn from Him.  But up to now, He was the only one to preach, to heal, to perform miracles.  John the Baptist was another preacher sent as a prophet of God, but he has been arrested, and as Mark tells us in this passage, he has been put to death.  So Jesus is the only one preaching and doing the ministry

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The Damnation of Unbelief, Mark 6:1-7 

The Bible teaches us that to believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God is the basis for our salvation, the means by which we become a child of God, for receiving eternal life. In John 1:12-13 we read, “But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, [even] to them that believe on his name: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.” Believing in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is the means by which

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Help for the hopeless, Mark 5: 21-43

A cursory reading of the scripture before us today might lead one to conclude that the point of Jesus ministry was to relieve misery and suffering in the world. And by extension, the ministry of the church should be the same.  Our mission should be one of social justice. I was reading the website of a very  large, old Presbyterian church that I saw in Wilmington the other day.  And on their website they mentioned they were about the transformative power of God’s grace.  That sounds good.  But if you read further, they defined their ministry as dismantling structural racism,

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Delivering the Demoniac, Mark 5:1-20  

Last week we looked at Jesus and the disciples, after a particularly exhausting day, crossing the Sea of Galilee in a boat in the evening, when they were overtaken by an extremely powerful storm. The boat they were on almost was sunk and their lives potentially lost, but Jesus, who had to be awakened from a deep sleep, stilled the storm and caused it to be completely calm. There was in ancient times a popular superstition that such powerful storms were caused by the devil. Sometimes I am tempted to believe that the devil does have some control over the

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Testing in a tempest, Mark 4:35-41   

We come today to the end of chapter four, but the story of Jesus’s ministry does not stop there.  He is simply traveling from one place to another.  And He does so in this story by means of a ship on the sea.  It’s a simple story, but one which provided a teachable lesson for the disciples, and which should be a lesson for us as well. It’s been a very long day of preaching and teaching and working miracles.  At one point the crowds were so large that Jesus and His disciples were not able to eat.  So  at

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The Parables of the Kingdom, Mark 4:21-34

Last week we looked at the parable of the sower. And Jesus indicated in explaining that parable it provides the key to understanding all the parables. I think that is because Jesus uses some common symbols or figures in that parable which he interprets privately to his disciples, and so we can use that interpretation in other parables which use the same symbols or figures. That hermeneutic principle is called “expositional constancy.” It means that the meaning of symbols or figures used in one scripture tend to mean the same as similar symbols or figures in another scripture. I think

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The Parable of the Sower, Mark 4:1-20

Mark doesn’t give us the chronology in which this next event happens. But Matthew indicates that this event is a continuation of a long day of teaching that Jesus had starting with the disciples picking the heads of grain as they walked through the fields on the Sabbath. On that same day, according to vs 1 of chapter 4, Jesus sat by the seashore. Jesus teaching at the beach seems to be a common occurrence in the gospels, as most of the time His teaching was outdoors. And on this occasion such large crowds gathered to Him that he moved

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Jesus chooses His disciples, Mark 3: 7-19

Mark 3:7-12 Jesus withdrew to the sea with His disciples; and a great multitude from Galilee followed; and [also] from Judea, and from Jerusalem, and from Idumea, and beyond the Jordan, and the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon, a great number of people heard of all that He was doing and came to Him. And He told His disciples that a boat should stand ready for Him because of the crowd, so that they would not crowd Him; for He had healed many, with the result that all those who had afflictions pressed around Him in order to touch Him.

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Lord of the Sabbath, Mark 2:18-3:6

I’m going to try to cover three events today in the ministry of Jesus which spans two chapters in Mark. That’s maybe an optimistic goal for me to accomplish in the time I have. But I think all three of these events have a common theme as I hope to show you. And what they have in common is Jesus’ dismissal of ritualistic, ceremonial laws which purport to have their basis in scripture, that purport to be the proper exercise of religion, but in fact are man’s additions to the law of God. The first event is found starting in

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God’s favor towards sinners, Mark 2:14-17

Last week we looked at the story of Jesus healing the paralytic man who was let down through the roof. I refer to it that way, because that is the way most people would remember it. But as I said last week, the most important thing about that event was not that the man was healed from his paralysis. But that Jesus forgave him of his sins. The main purpose for which Jesus came was to preach the gospel of salvation. To bring forgiveness to sinners and give them new life. If you remember, I spoke of Jesus in that

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