Today we are picking up where we left off in Mark’s gospel last time. As you will recall, Jesus called certain of the disciples away with Him to a mountain, and there He commissioned 12 of them to be His disciples. These were to be the men who would be closest to Him, to whom He would have intimate fellowship. He called them apart from the crowds, from the multitudes, from the world to Himself. They would become closer to Him than even His family. They would in fact be His family, even the foundation of His body, which is

Read More…

When US presidents leave office, it is very common today to hear news commentators remark about what that president’s legacy will be. And the presidents themselves seem to be very concerned about it. So they go out of their way to enact certain legislation or reforms or do certain things in order to establish a legacy that will be viewed favorably by future generations. Before the engines have cooled on Air Force One, they usually have written a book or two, a biography and spent millions preparing their library. In contrast to the self aggrandizing actions by the most powerful

Read More…

The nature of the gospel is the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is the character and nature of Jesus. Jesus is the exact representation of God’s nature. Hebrews 1:3 says, “[Jesus] is the radiance of His glory (speaking of God) and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power.” The good news then, the gospel of Jesus Christ, is that He has manifested God’s nature to us, and being God in the flesh, has become our propitiation through His sacrifice, in order to reconcile us to God. Now we could spend a

Read More…

The Bible has a lot to say about food and eating. Some of you are very appreciative of that fact. My wife thinks that food is next to godliness. You’ve heard the phrase, “the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach?” Well, my wife thinks it should be “the way to God is through a man’s stomach.” She loves food and loves to cook. Her solution to all of life’s problems is to make a cake. When we were first married, she hadn’t been a Christian long. And so she was very disappointed to learn that in heaven

Read More…

I’ve said it many times before, that every miracle of the gospels is a spiritual parable, meant to teach spiritual principles. And we are looking at such a miracle today and the spiritual principles that we can learn from it. Last time we talked about the gospel’s authority over the spiritual realm and the physical realm; the spiritual realm was illustrated by Jesus casting out the demon of the man in Capernaum, and then the physical realm was illustrated by the healing of the leper. Today, Mark is showing us the priority of the spiritual over the physical. The purpose

Read More…

Mark writes in the opening verse of this book, “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” Gospel comes from the Greek word euaggelion, which means good news. And so thus far in this book, Mark has been showing us various aspects of the gospel. Last time we looked at the message of the gospel, which is repentance of your sins and faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. Then we looked at the ministry of the gospel, which is to make disciples. Today, we are looking another aspect of the gospel, which is

Read More…

When Mark introduced this book, he said simply in vs1, that it was the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Gospel means good news, and was from the Greek word euangellion which was in use throughout the Roman Empire to announce festivals associated with emperor worship. When a new ruler took power, there was a herald that went through the kingdom announcing his coming, proclaiming the good news and calling the people to get ready for his appearing. So in like manner, Mark uses this word to describe the coming of the Kingdom of God.

Read More…

Today we begin our study in the gospel of Mark. Mark is the shortest of all the gospels. It is thought by some to be the first of the four gospels written. And yet, I have saved it for last. We have finished Matthew, Luke and John and now it behooves us to look at this book. And following Mark’s example at directness and terseness, I don’t want to spend a lot of time on an introduction and filling in all sorts of biographical details. I want to get right to the message, just as Mark did. I will only

Read More…

I thought I was going to be through with John last week. We finished up 1 John last Sunday, and I had planned on beginning the book of Mark, which is something I wanted to do months ago actually. But when I began to study Mark in preparation for this week, I did not feel that God was leading me to do so at this time. I think that there is still some more that He wants to teach us from John’s letters. And so this Sunday we are going to look at this very small book of 2 John

Read More…