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You're listening to a message preached at Front Range Baptist Church by Pastor Dean Miller. It is our prayer that this message will be a help and an encouragement to you in your spiritual walk. Now, here's Pastor Miller.

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We're going to fly tonight. Are you ready to fly? All right. We're going to our snacks will come at the end instead of during the flight. We will uh we'll survive. We're going to put the slides down, let you slide out on the emergency exits, and uh we'll head out. We're going through flight 66. For those of you that may be new tonight, we um we're flying through the Bible from looking at the Bible from cruising altitude. And it's important to remember that the Bible is one book in a collection of books, but it's one, it's one story, and it's a tremendous story of the Lord Jesus Christ and of God's work through his son. And the gospel of Mark is a tremendous, tremendous gospel. So we're gonna we're gonna jump right into it tonight. So if you find it in your Bible, um, we're gonna have to hustle tonight. So you listen careful as we fly through, but uh we're moving, we're gonna move fast because we're coming to a book that moves fast. Mark is a fast-moving book. I heard somebody say one time that that uh the book of Matthew is uh the book of Matthew is is like a uh is like a diary of Jesus recording all his words. Uh the book of Luke is like the slideshow presentation. Uh Mark is the action movie. It's the motion picture. It flies right through the life of Jesus. And uh, so we're gonna be moving. Everything is moving, uh, everything is is uh moving fast paced in this book. Jesus is preaching, he's calling people, he's healing people, he's cleansing people, he's casting out devils, he's feeding multitudes. We see the two multitudes that he fed, 5,000, 4,000. He's gonna do all of that, he's gonna calm storms, he's gonna confront the hypocrisy of the religious people, he's gonna teach his disciples, he's gonna suffer, he's gonna die, he's gonna rise again. And when you read this book, you kind of finish breathless. It's just, you just fly through the book. He he doesn't start with a genealogy, uh, he doesn't record the birth of Christ, he doesn't do like John does and go back into eternity past and show the origins of the Lord Jesus Christ in eternity in heaven forever as God. He doesn't take us back to Bethlehem, he doesn't take us back to the throne of God, he just starts and he just moves. And the reason why is because Mark, as many of you already know, is portraying Jesus as the suffering servant. He is the servant. And what's in we're gonna find out why Mark does this in just a moment, but in Matthew is important for Matthew to give a genealogy because it was important uh as a king. He had to prove what his lineage was, what his tie to David was, what tribe did he come from? Did he have a right to claim his kingship? And then when you get to Luke, you're gonna find that Luke's gospel is gonna have a uh a genealogy because it's gonna prove that he was in fact a man, and that he had ties back to Adam through the humanity of uh of his birth. And so uh we're gonna see that when we get to Luke, but uh Jesus is not introduced by a genealogy, and the reason for it is because a servant is not, nobody cares where a servant came from, only what a servant gets done. You could almost at the beginning of Mark's gospel just put up with that big sign that just says man at work. I've always wondered why city construction crews use a sign that says men at work. Because usually just one doing it and five watching. But here it's man at work, and there's just the man, Christ Jesus, uh, at work. Uh the key verse in this book is in Mark chapter 10, verse 45. For the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many. And this book really shows how this, this, that verse shows how the book falls into its division. You're gonna see the division of the book, the first two-thirds of the book, and I want to say it this way, it's it's two-thirds technically, but it's it's really almost one half of the book is the life of Jesus Christ, his from his from his beginning of his ministry throughout his work. And then the rest of the book, that final third, chapters 10 or 11 through 16, is that one week of Christ's life. So Luke, Luke kind of flies through the first few years of Christ's life, and then he slows way down in that last week, because that's why he came. And so he's gonna show us that Jesus came to minister, and he's gonna show us how he did that in two-thirds of the book, and then he came to give his life, and he's gonna show how he did that in the last third of the book. His life was service, his death was sacrifice, and uh Jesus came working and serving. Now, who's the author of this book? The author of the book is John Mark. Alright, that's his official name in the Bible, John Mark. He's not to be confused with the Apostle John, he's not to be confused with John the Baptist. He is John Mark, who is a cousin of Barnabas, and uh he's a convert of Peter. So Peter, most likely, when Jesus sent out his disciples to go witness, most likely Peter led Mark to Christ. He's gonna talk about Mark later in the book of 1 Peter and 2 Peter, and he's gonna tell them that's my son in the faith. He's the one that led him to Christ. But it's an amazing, it's an amazing connection that he has. He was Mark was not one of the twelve apostles. Uh he was closely connected to the apostles. His mother Mary, not Mother Mary, the mother of Jesus, or Mary Magdalene, but the other Mary, she had a home in Jerusalem. And it was in that home that believers gathered in one of the early gatherings of the church in the book of Acts. In fact, they were gathered in that house in Acts chapter 12 when Peter was in jail. And Peter's in prison, and the church gathers at Mary's house in Jerusalem, and the church is in a big prayer meeting. Oh God, deliver Peter. Oh God, deliver Peter. And the angel comes and gets him up and leads him out of the jail past all the doors and all the legions of guards, brings him right out in the street and says, Okay, you're free to go. And so where does he go? He runs to Mary's house and he knocks at the door, and Rhoda opens the door, and she's like, Who is it? And he said, It's Peter. And she said, No, who is it? It's Peter. She closes the door, she runs back in. Hey, Peter's at the door. They're like, No, he's not, Mary. There's uh Rhoda. There's no way. Because they're typical Baptists. They pray and never really expect God to answer. But um by the way, how many of us are like that? How many of you have been praying for something? Then you check the mailbox and you say, I can't believe it. God heard my prayer. Uh but but uh but that was in Mary's house, the mother of John Mark. Uh his family was from the island of Crete. Uh, and this is one of the reasons why on that first missionary journey that he went with Paul and Barnabas, John Mark's first missionary journey out, that he did so well in the island of Crete. There was, I'm sure he met a lot of his relatives. He felt at home. But then when they crossed over and they went into Turkey and he had that hard climb up those mountains, he said, Sinara, and he quit and he went back home. Uh and that was a major problem for the Apostle Paul because he went home. We don't really know exactly why he went home. Perhaps he was homesick, maybe he was afraid, maybe he maybe and I I tend to believe that Paul that Mark had a had a in his early life had an issue with fear because one of the unique things to the Gospel of Mark is about a young man in the garden who fled when they came to take Jesus, and uh they grabbed a hold of his tunic and he ran out of his coat and he fled naked, which just means that he bare his legs and he ran out in some kind of shame. But the the sense of that was that whoever this young man was, he was a follower of Christ, he was in the proximity of Christ, but he was fearful, and he was really one of the first to flee when persecution came. And I think that followed him into his ministry with the Apostle Paul, and when it got hard, he went home. And you know how many Christians find ourselves as John Mark, and when it gets hard, we go home. That's where that's where disciples are made, but he ends up being profitable. Paul writes later and said, Hey, bring Mark to me. He is profitable unto me in the ministry. And uh, I think it's one of the most encouraging details that's connected with this book is that a man who once failed in his service, perhaps even fled from Christ in shame and fear, was restored and redeemed by grace and became profitable in the work of the Lord. And he went with Peter, by the way. Let me just give you a little snippet of history. This is not in the Bible, but it's it's tradition and historical. But we do know that he traveled with Peter extensively and ended up in Rome with Peter. Rome, Peter called it Babylon, but that was the reference to Rome. But he was there with Peter, and this is most likely Peter's account that John Mark writes down. And um it's it's probably the earliest of the Gospels. And it served kind of as a baseline for the other gospels. In fact, I'll get ahead of myself a little bit here, but in fact, um, it's the shortest of the gospels, but if you took out Jesus' three main discourses in the book of Matthew, then Mark is actually longer than Matthew's. And uh it's the shortest of the Gospels, it's the fastest pace of the Gospels, and it is synonymous with Matthew and Luke, and in fact, there's only a few things in here that are unique to Mark, and if you boil it all down, it's between, I tried to count them, and I came up with a couple of different numbers, but they were all between 30 and 40. The first time I counted it was 31, the second time I counted it was 33, and the third time I counted it was 38, and I didn't know which one it was. So I just said between 30 and 40 verses in the book of Mark are unique only to the book of Mark. Everything else is in the other gospels, and it really serves as a foundation. But Mark traveled with Peter, but there was a point when he was sent to Egypt down to Alexandria, and God used Mark in such a great way in Alexandria, there was such a sweeping revival that it took, it took that many of the big officials of that day took note of that. And in fact, Mark died in Alexandria, and another group from up north came and stole his body to borrow holiness. Uh, I don't know how that works to borrow somebody's holiness, but you can go to St. Mark's Cathedral and you can see him, and you can see an image of his stolen body, and you can borrow holiness, is what they do. And I don't know how you do that, but uh but Mark was a tremendous restored servant of God. And I love that the Lord let him write this gospel. Um He writes this gospel with Gentiles in mind and primarily the Romans. There's a lot of Latin reference in this book, and in fact, you you can tell that it is that is really a Roman slant in this book that he has the Roman audience in mind. One of the reasons why he didn't include a genealogy, because the Romans didn't really care about a man's birth. They cared about what a man could do. What does he accomplish? What does he do? And um, they were politically driven that way. What good is a man? And so Mark really laid out the accomplishments of Christ. But you'll find that anytime he makes a reference to a Hebrew word or an Aramaic word, he interprets it. And it kind of gets annoying when you read Mark's gospel because he'll say, like, and this blind man was Bartimaeus, son of Timaeus. It's like, well, we knew that. Bartimaeus means the son of Timaeus, and you'll find different places where he will say that Jesus said Tabitha, which means damsel, arise, or whatever. So he interprets all of these Hebrew words and Aramaic words, and he's interpreting them because the Roman reader wouldn't know what they were talking about. And so he's making it clear to the Roman leader. In fact, it's really interesting that when you read Mark's account of Pontius Pilate, Pontius Pilate doesn't seem so bad in Mark's gospel. And I don't want to get ahead of myself, but I will. Mark includes the Roman centurion at the cross, declaring, truly this man was the Son of God. That would have rang true in the hearts of the Romans. So he explains Jewish customs, he translates the words. The Roman world is uh was a Roman world that respected power, it respected strength and action and authority and conquest. And Mark shows all of that in the greatest man who ever lived. And uh we're gonna we're gonna look at it. Uh one of the things that you'll notice in the book is that Mark uses the word straightway or immediately, um about 41 times in the book, and uh you're kind of immediately fatigued by the time you get to 16 uh because it's just immediately, immediately, immediately when you read it, it's just and Jesus did this. Almost every verse starts with and and he went here and did this, and straightway and immediately, and and Mark is not giving a description of how Jesus went. He's just saying, and Jesus did this, and then he did this, and then he did this, and right after that he did this, and then he went here and did that. And now let me show you another thing straightway that he did, and he's just showing how Mark uh or how Jesus was moving with a sense of urgency in his ministry. Um, he focuses on the works of Jesus. Matthew focuses on the words of Jesus. If you want to know what Jesus said, go to Matthew, fill with red letter. If you want to know what Jesus did, go to Mark and you'll see. And by the way, both of those go hand in hand because Jesus was a hearer and a doer. He knew the word and he did the word. And man, what an example for us. But he moves all the way through it. And I want you to understand that when you read Mark, Jesus is not just aimless. He's not drifting, he's not just going around wasting time, he is moving deliberately, he's got purpose, and he's got his face set like a flint towards the call that God has put in his life. Another interesting tidbit about the book of Mark. I had never really seen this much until I had read through this a couple more times before tonight. But Mark gives a ton of attention. I haven't done a full comparison yet between all the gospels. But Mark does a huge emphasis on the prayer life of Jesus. And that really struck me because Mark has always been to me a book of busyness. Jesus was always going. But there are a dozen or more references of Jesus getting alone with the Father and praying. And I will tell you this one of the things that I took from that is if you're going to be busy and you're going to be on the move for God, you better take time to be with him. You can only be busy for so long in your own power. You have to have his power. And Jesus was a man moving in the power of God. I love that. Um, in the first half of the book, the emphasis is on the service and the power of Jesus. In the last half of the book, it's the suffering and the passion of Jesus. And he, in the first half, he meets people with compassion and authority. In the second half, he meets the cross with humility and he gives his life for the sinners. So we're going to jump into it. Are you ready? Number one, we're going to look at, let's let's look at our first thing is the first 13 verses in chapter 1, we see the servant introduced. Mark wastes no time. Look at the beginning of the book. The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. I mean, he wastes no time. I mean, here we are. Here's the ministry of Christ, and here's who he is. He is the Son of God. And he introduces him immediately with this was written by the prophets. So this man didn't just come out of nowhere. He came, prof prophesied, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee. The voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight paths. John did baptize in the wilderness and preached the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins. And there went out unto him all the land of Judea and they of Jerusalem, and were all baptized of him in the river of Jordan, confessing their sins. And then he gives some time to explain who John the Baptist was. John the Baptist, the forerunner of Christ, preparing the way for the Lord. John preaches repentance. He points people away from himself. Jesus comes to him to be baptized. And John said, Man, I need to be baptized with you. Jesus said, nope, this is going to fulfill all righteousness. And Jesus is baptized by John as an identification with death. Jesus went down into the Jordan. There's so much I want to say about that. But he comes up out of the water, the Holy Spirit comes upon him like a dove, and the Father speaks from heaven. This is my beloved Son. Thou art my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. And what happens? Before Jesus ever performed a miracle in the book, before he ever healed anybody that was sick, before he ever did one thing to cleanse or feed or anybody, the Father declares his pleasure in him. So now everything that's going to happen in this book after that already has the stamp of approval of Almighty God on it. And this is what Luke that Mark is trying to communicate. So it's interesting here when you get to the second stop. We're going to look at verses 14 through chapter 3, verse 35. Is now the servant has been introduced, and now he begins his ministry. And I want to read a portion of scripture. And you pay attention to the ands and the immediately's and the theirs and so forth. Watch this. Watch this in verse number um, verse number uh, let's go to verse number 9. And it came to pass in those days that Jesus came from Jerusalem of Galilee, and was baptized of John and Jordan, and straightway came up out of the water, he saw the heavens open, and the spirit like a dove descending upon him, and there came a voice from heaven saying, Thou art my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. And immediately the Spirit driveth them into the wilderness, and he was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted of Satan, and was there with the wild beast, and the angels ministered unto him. Now, after that John was put in prison, Jesus came unto Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent ye and believe the gospel. Now, as he walked by the sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew's brother casting a net of the sea, for they were fishers, and Jesus said to them, Come after me, and I will make you to become fishers of men, and straightway they forsook their nets and followed their nets and followed him. And it is just, Jesus is just moving in this book. I mean, we covered his baptism to the wilderness, to 40 days, out to the Galilee, all the way up to the Galilee to the calling of Peter, James, and John, all in just a breath. And straightway, and straightway, and straightway, Jesus is serving. In verses 14 through chapter 3 and verse 35, we see him begin his ministry. This is what's important about chapter 1. And we'll jump to we'll jump to the rest of this point in just a second. But in chapter 1, Jesus is baptized, he's tempted. He goes into the wilderness and he wins. Adam was in the garden and lost. Jesus went in the wilderness with nothing but wild beasts. Adam was in the garden with everything. To eat and still wanted more. Jesus went in with nothing to eat, surrounded by nothing but those that would eat him. And Jesus came out victorious. John is put into prison and Jesus comes out preaching. He starts calling his followers and he goes to preach. And notice verse 21. They went into Capernaum, and straight away on the Sabbath day, he entered into the what? He entered into the synagogue in Capernaum. Those of you that were with us on our Israel trip last time, we went in this synagogue. Jesus goes in this synagogue and there he preaches in this synagogue. He entered in and he taught. And they were astonished at his doctrine, for he taught them as one that had authority and not as the scribes. Now this is interesting because remember, keep the Roman in mind who's reading this. What goes on in those synagogues? Like they see what comes out of the synagogues, these Pharisees who go around and just tell everybody what the law says, but Jesus goes in there and teaches not as one of them, but as somebody who has authority to teach. Now the Roman reader is intrigued by this. What goes on in the synagogue? Jesus goes in the synagogue and he teaches, and by the way, that synagogue in Capernaum was interesting because there was a tie to a centurion with that synagogue. But Jesus goes in there, teaches, comes out, and watch what happens. Verse 23. And there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit. Now the Roman reader is going to say, I knew there was something wrong with that stuff. There was a demon in the synagogue. Jesus goes into that synagogue, teaches with authority, and what happens when you go into the place and teach the word of God with authority? It rouses up the devil. So now this demon comes out of the synagogue and starts saying, verse 24, let us alone. What have we to do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou come to destroy us? I know thee who thou art, the Holy One of God. Now you would think, man, that's unbelievable. Now the devil's preaching, the demon is preaching about who Jesus is. And what does Jesus say? Jesus rebukes him and says, Hold thy peace and come out of him. Don't ever forget that Satan is a preacher of righteousness. He has ministers of righteousness. 2 Corinthians. He goes into places where the word of God is taught, but he takes away its authority. He diminishes its authority and power. He will even preach something that sounds true. But it is meant to confuse and to destroy. Listen, Jesus did not want an unclean spirit declaring to the world who he was. This would have brought a lot of confusion in people's minds to tie him into a league with satanic forces. And Jesus rebukes that demon. Hold your peace, come out of him. And when the unclean spirit came out, he cried with a loud voice, came out of him. They were all amazed. And by the way, that's another thing you're going to see in Mark. Mark always zooms the camera over. He's showing Jesus moving, and then he zooms the camera to the crowd. And he always captures the reaction. They marveled. They were astonished. They were amazed. He always shows the responses of the crowd. And to the Roman reader, it's like, look what he did, and then look what people thought about it. Look what he did, and look what look at the impact it had on the multitude. And so this everybody's amazed at what he just did. And they question this doctrine. What is it? What doctrine is this? What authority commands even the unclean spirits? And they do obey him. And immediately his fame spread abroad throughout all the regions about Galilee. So what does Jesus do? Jesus goes into the synagogue, he preaches, and there he casts out a demon from that synagogue. Then he goes out of the synagogue and he enters into the house of Simon and Andrew and Simon's mom-in-law is sick and he heals her. Then he comes out in verse 40 and he heals a leper. And then he tells the leper not to tell anybody. And the leper goes out and publishes it everywhere. And sometimes we read that and we think, yeah, well, I mean, you know, why wouldn't he tell everybody? Well, he shouldn't have told anybody. Jesus told him not to. And that creates as much a confusion about the identity of Jesus Christ as much as the devil doing it. And can I just can I just make a point here? Whether it's a demon or whether it's just a disobedient believer, it can bring confusion into the work of God. It can bring confusion about who Christ is. Do you know that that Satan is doing all he can to cast confusion on who Christ is? But do you know the biggest question mark in people's minds of why they deny Jesus? It's not from what they heard about Satan and what they hear from Satan's deception, it's what they see in the life of disobedient believers. I don't want to follow Christ because of those people. They say that they're Christians, and look what they do. Disobedient people can have a greater adverse effect on the gospel than the devil can. And so in chapter 1, he hits the ground running, and basically what he just throws the curtain back and says that Jesus has just stepped into the stage and there is a massive spiritual war. Satan has got his guns aimed at him. Satan owns religion. Satan is in, he is in this world active to get people to not obey the word of God, and Jesus is up against this spiritual battle. Chapter 2, Jesus heals another man. He calls Matthew from, and this was another major blow to the Jews, but the Romans would have been like, hey, I like this guy. He went to the guy who was collecting taxes for us. And he called him. He's one of us. And then Jesus goes in at the end of chapter 2 and he challenges the Pharisees on the Sabbath day. Who was the Sabbath made for? Was it made for man or was it made for, was man made for the Sabbath, or was Sabbath made for the man? And Jesus has to uh he has to uh abrade them for that. Chapter 3, he again heals another man. Multitudes begin to follow Christ. Then he ordains the 12 disciples to preach, and he sends them out all over to preach the gospel, and uh and they go everywhere preaching. And then Jesus is in a house, and his mother and his brothers come to him, and they want him to come back home because he's beside himself. He's gone mad, he's claiming to be the Messiah. And they said, Hey, your mother's out there, your brothers are out there, and Jesus doesn't go out. In fact, he says, Who is my mother and my brethren? But those that do the will of my father. That's who my brethren are. Those who want to obey God. And you've got to remember, his brother James is probably in that group. His brother James is not a believer. They think that he's gone mad. His mother Mary knows who he is, but she's concerned that if he goes out and broadcasting that he's the Messiah, they're gonna kill him. And that's exactly what they're gonna do. She's concerned for him. James doesn't believe in him, and the family wants to draw him away, and Jesus does not get discouraged by that. Let me show you what Jesus is doing. What he's doing, what Mark is doing in these first few things, this first chapter, he shows the spiritual battle. Then he shows Jesus exercising authority. He teaches with authority, he casts out unclean spirits with authority, he heals Peter's mother-in-law, he cleanses a leper, he forgives and heals a paralyzed man. He calls Matthew from the receipt of customs from a well-paid job and a position of honor in Rome. Calls him to him to go now minister to the Jews as an outcast. This is, I mean, he has greater authority now in Matthew's life than the Roman Empire does. Then he confronts the whole religious organization of Israel. And he does it with power. It's an amazing thing. And here's the one of the great stories. In Mark chapter 2, we ran past it, but he heals the paralyzed man that's brought by his friends, and they they cut up the roof and they put him down. And and Jesus says to him, He's going to heal him. And remember, remember what remember what the man, the the Pharisees that were around were criticizing him? And Jesus said, just so that you know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins. Because he said, Thy sins be forgiven. His greatest need was not his paralysis, his greatest need was his sin. And Jesus forgave his sin, and once he forgave his sin, they mocked him for that, and then Jesus said, Just to show you that I have power to forgive sins, what would be easier to say? Forgive sins or to get up and walk? And they said, Well, you know, to forgive sins, because you can't really see that. And he said, Okay, just to show you that I can do that, get up and walk, and the guy walks. The whole thing is an emphasis on the authority of Jesus Christ, that he has the authority of God on his life. Then we get to chapter four, and this is where the servant teaches the word. So we see him introduced, we see him ministering with authority, and now we see him teaching the word of God. By the way, there should be authority with God before we teach the word of God. The minister needs to spend time with God before he preaches the word of God. You can preach the word of God, but if you don't preach the word of God with the authority of God, the word of God, the word of God is, it doesn't have the reception. When you preach the word of God in the power of God, there's an unction there. And it's an amazing thing. Jesus begins to preach, and he gives the parable of the sower. He talks about the four soils and the different hearts of people that receive the word. And that's repeated in the other gospels, and that's a great parable for us to review. How is my heart when the word is preached? What's the preparation of my heart that many people hear the word, but they don't have a faithful heart to receive? James says, if you don't receive the word with meekness, with a submission to that. If you don't receive the word with a prepared heart to obey the word, then you'll become a hearer only and not a doer. And if you're always a learner and never a doer, you deceive yourself. You're lying to yourself. And it's one thing to believe the devil's lie, it's another thing to believe the lie that you tell yourself. That knowing is the battle. Listen, there's a lot of Christians walking around with a head filled with Bible knowledge, but cannot overcome temptation in their own heart. We are hearers but not doers to know how to apply the word of God. So every time we hear the word of God taught, we should ask, what kind of soil is my heart right now? Am I ready to receive? In verses 35 of chapter 4 through chapter 6, the end of chapter 6, we see Jesus the servant display his authority. After he teaches the word, and I just want to point out one thing. One of the things that's unique to the Gospel of Mark is in chapter 4, verse 26, when he gives the parable of the growing seed. The kingdom of God is as a man casts seed into the ground and should sleep and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up. He knoweth not how. The earth bringeth forth fruit of herself. So here's a man that just preaches the word of God and sows the word of God, and then all of a sudden there is fruit. I think of, when I read that, I thought of Adonai Judson. Seven years in Burma preaching, never one convert. He translated the Bible into the Burmese language. The very first act that he did after he translated the Bible was fall on his face and repent for even trying. God, forgive me for even trying to put your word in this language. And yet, that's the Bible they still use in Burma, in Myanmar. They still use that Bible. And seven years, not one convert, and now it just sprang up. And there are millions that have been saved through that ministry. But Jesus begins to teach and show his authority, and then he shows that in verse 35. Watch. And then the same day when the even was come, he said unto them, Let us pass over unto the other side. And when they had sent away the multitudes, they took him, even as he was in their ship. And remember what happened. Now Jesus puts them in the ship, and then the wind begins to blow. Everybody's fearful, and Jesus gets up and rebukes the wind. Peace be still, verse 39. Why are ye so fearful? How is it that you have no faith? They feared exceedingly, and they said one to another, What manner of man is this that even the wind and the sea obey him? So Jesus begins to demonstrate his authority in a series of miracles. He calms the Sea of Galilee in chapter 4. In chapter 5, he goes over the sea and he cast out the legion of demons in the demonic man in Gadera. Those of us that were in Israel, that place that we stayed at the Sea of Galilee, that was where, that was right near Gadera where Jesus came over and cast out the demons from this man who was in the tombs. Then he goes through the town and heals the woman with an issue of blood. He then raises Jarius' daughter from the dead. He feeds the 5,000 in this passage of scripture. He walks on the water in these chapters from chapter 5 and 6. It's an amazing feat of all the things that Jesus is doing. These are not random miracles. Mark is showing us that Jesus has authority over every realm. To the Roman reader, this was an amazing feat that this man had power to do what he did. And they would have been asking, what manner of man is this? Just like the disciples asked, what kind of man has power over the wind and over the waves? Who is this man? Mark answered that question in the very first verse. He is Jesus Christ, the Son of God. And these miracles show what Jesus can do over every realm. He had authority over disease. He had authority over nature. He had authority over demons. He had authority over death. He had authority over the law of nature with the feeding of the 5,000. He could multiply all of those things to those people. Jesus did all of that. And by the way, it was not just a view of his authority, but it was also of compassion. How many people in the Roman Empire rose to great political power through great exploits, but had no compassion? Politicians who didn't care about their people. We see it in our world today. We see it in America today. But when Jesus calmed the storm, he was caring for his frightened disciples. When Jesus went across the sea, he was going to a tormented man in the tomb. When Jesus walked through the multitude, he cared about a suffering woman in that crowd. Jesus cared about a grieving father who had just lost his little girl. Jesus looked at that multitude of hungry people and he fed them in a desert place. He had compassion. You see, in chapter 6, in chapter 4 and 5, the end of 4, and then all of 5, Jesus is exercising his authority, but from a heart of compassion. It's not that I'm doing this so that I can reign over you. I've come to minister to you. In chapter 6, we see what can stop a servant from working. The servant can't work in chapter 6. Look at verse number 1. He went out from thence and came into his own country, and his disciples followed him. When the Sabbath day was come, he began to teach in the synagogue, and many hearing him were astonished, saying, From whence hath this man these things? And what wisdom is this which is given unto him? That even such mighty works are wrought by his hands? Is not this the carpenter? And some of them were offended by him. Watch this in verse 4. But Jesus said, A prophet is not without honor, but in his own country. Now look at verse 5, and notice this very carefully. He could there do no mighty work save that he laid his hands on a few sick folk and healed them. And he marveled because of their unbelief. So here we find the servant can't work because the people would not believe. The people were amazed at what he did, but they would not believe on him. Jesus was amazed at their unbelief. How can I do these things and you not know who I am? The disciples were then sent out to preach at the end of chapter 6. Here he sends them out to preach. And there's a there's a there's a story here that Mark inserts about Herod being fearful of Jesus because he thought it was John coming back from the dead and his conscience had hit him. And now all of his disciples are out preaching everywhere. And Herod was troubled by this because he silenced one man's voice, but he couldn't silence all these voices that were proclaiming about Jesus Christ. And uh it's just a great, I love that because now when Jesus wasn't going to be believed on where he was, he sent his disciples out everywhere to preach. And probably in that time is where Mark was saved. In that time they went preaching. Mark chapter 7 through chapter 8, verse 26, in this section, this is the servant comforting the heart or confronting the hearts. He confronts the hearts of the Pharisees here. Jesus steps into the way of the tradition of the Pharisees and he just lays those traditions to waste. The religious leaders were concerned because the disciples were eating with unwashed hands. And Jesus says, let's talk about defilement. What really defiles a man? Is it what goes into his body or what comes out of his body? Listen, I mean, is the cell phone really defiling the heart of humanity? Or is the heart of humanity defiling the cell phone? I mean, you don't think that you've ever had lust in places before technology? You don't think that there's rape and incest and fornication and adultery in the Amish communities where they've never seen a screen? So is it what goes into a man that defiles him, or is it what comes out of a man that defiles him? This is the point, right? Man defiles what he touches. It's not what man touches that necessarily defiles him. Man is defiled because of sin. Man has a deeper issue. Yes, you should wash your hands. There are germs, but Jesus was more concerned with what was in the heart of man, while these people were more concerned with outward rituals than inward righteousness. And Jesus laid that bare. In verse number 6 of chapter 7, he says, This people honoreth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. That's the warning. Jesus calls out the religious crowd that was religious outwardly, but away from God inwardly. And Jesus lays this, he lays the wood here. He says, From within, out of the heart of man proceeds evil thoughts. And he lists all the sins, adultery, fornication, murder. Where did all that start? We didn't just learn that through video games. We put it in the video game. We didn't learn that from Hollywood. We made Hollywood. Our hearts defiled that. That did not defile us. It's just a mirror of our defilement. Man's heart is the problem. And Jesus laid that bare in these passages of scripture. And then he goes out and he heals a deaf man. That's unique to Mark's gospel here. He spits on the guy, you know, Jesus straight away. The Bible says in verse 33, he took him aside from the multitude, put his fingers into his ears, and spit. And then touched his tongue. I don't know where Jesus spit, but he just, you know, if he spit down, I don't know where he spit, but he put his fingers in the guy's ears, then he spit, then he touched the guy's tongue, and the guy could hear, he could talk and hear. It's an amazing story. It's better than the guy who Jesus actually spit than rubbed it on his eyes. Spit in your eye. But Jesus is showing compassion in these miracles. In chapter 8, Jesus, in chapter 7, there he goes outside the borders of Israel and he helps the Syrophoenician woman. He heals this deaf woman or this deaf man. He was in Gentile territory. This would speak loudly to the Romans that Jesus did not just come for his own, but to those that were far off. And that anyone could be saved. Then he feeds the 4,000 in Gentile territory. Then in chapter 8, another unique miracle to Mark's gospel, he heals the blind man. And it's the only miracle that takes place in state. Jesus heals them the first time and then he goes, Hey, can you see? And the guy's like, Yeah. He goes, What do you see? He's like, I see men as trees walking. First of all, how did the guy know what a tree was? But he's like, I see men as trees walking, and then Jesus touches them again and heals them again. My dad preaches a great message on the second touch. It's a great message on that. But I really believe that in this passage of scripture, there was a blindness that the Pharisees had. Jesus had just warned about that, the leaven of the Pharisees, there was a blindness in their heart to the things of God. They were blind and could not see. They had experienced God, but they could not see anything else but men as just backdrops of nature. They didn't see people as souls, but other other than just parts of nature. But then Jesus touched them a second time and then he saw clearly. But not only that, but the disciples had blindness. Jesus had to ask them in this passage of scripture, why do you guys not yet believe? How many baskets did you pick up after that thing? Who did that? Where did you get them? How did that happen? They were blind. There was a blindness of the Pharisees, there was a blindness of the disciples, and I think there's a lot packed into this why Jesus took stages to heal this man. Because they had to come to be able to see clearly who he was. And on the heels of that, that leads us to the turning point in the gospel. And this is chapters 8, verses 27 through chapter 10. And this is the servant reveals the cross. This is the turning point in Mark's gospel because right after that, Jesus says, Who do men say that I am? And then he asks the personal question, Who do you say I am? And Peter immediately confesses, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. Immediately after that confession, notice what happens. In fact, look at it, if you will, please. Chapter 8 here. Notice what happens. Jesus says in verse number 29, But whom say ye that I am? Peter said, Thou art the Christ. He charged them that they should tell no man of him. And he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected of the elders, and the chief priests and scribes him be killed after three days rise again. And this is important because he's been laying out the foundation that Jesus has all this authority. This is speaking to the Roman heart, to the Roman intellect, to the Roman man. Like this is a man of power. This is a man that should be followed. But then Jesus is going to say, but wait a minute, I'm going to have to go suffer and die. And rise again. And that's not going to be accidental. I'm not going to be taken by Roman might. I'm laying my life down. This is the plan. This is not just something that's going to befall me. This is why I'm here. And begins to teach them. And notice what happens. Peter then took him and rebuked him. And Jesus turned about and said, Get thee behind me, Satan. I've just always made a note. Dean, if Jesus ever calls you the devil, it's not good. Jesus says, Get thee behind me, Satan. Warren Wearsby said it this way: He said, One minute Peter is inspired from heaven, the next minute his tongue is ignited by hell. Thou art the Christ. You'll never die. I'll never let him take you. Peter wanted the crown without a cross. He was like many believers. He wanted victory without suffering. But Jesus knew the Father's will, and Jesus gave him the call of discipleship right here. He said, If you're going to follow me, you don't have to deny yourself, take up your cross. Come after me. You see, this would have been really a heavy blow now to the Roman who would have thought, man, I can follow this guy because this guy has ambition. And now, wait a minute, I've got to die to my ambition and I've got to yield to his and I've got to follow him. This is the great misunderstanding of the nature of the kingdom of heaven. Many believers today follow Jesus Christ for how it benefits them. I'm going to go to church if it'll fix my marriage, if I can get my job back. And we want to come there so that we can get what we need. And Jesus said, You need to give up your life and lose it. Follow me, and you'll find your life. So what do they do right after this? They start arguing about who's going to be the greatest in the kingdom. James and John are asking for a place of honor. The disciples are, they rebuke the kids, get out of here, we don't have time for you. And Jesus said, Who are you guys? And Jesus shows them that greatness in the kingdom is different from greatness in the world. And that would have been a major point of emphasis to the Roman reader. The world says greatness is being over others. Remember that Roman centurion that came to Jesus? I'm a man of authority. I say to one, go and he goes. That was spoken volumes to Romans, to be to the Romans to be a man in authority. But the heart of Mark comes when Jesus says, the Son of Man did not come to be ministered unto. I didn't come for an army of servants. I came to be a servant and to give my life. You cannot follow a crucified Savior with a self-centered spirit. The way of Christ is a way of surrender, sacrifice, and service. Amen? Alright, now we see the suffering servant entering Jerusalem. Chapters 11 through 13. He's now in Jerusalem, and this is where Mark's quick pace begins to slow. Mark shows the public praise that Jesus has, but how shallow that is. They're going to cry, Hosanna, but it's actually going to be followed by cries of rejection. Jesus goes in and cleanses the temple. He confronts the religious corrupt. He teaches about faith. He teaches about prayer. He teaches about forgiveness. He teaches about authority. He teaches about taxes. He's teaching about everything in these minutes. He's talking about the greatest commandment, hypocrisy, giving, future judgment. I mean, Jesus is unloading all of this great truth in this small window. And in this passage, too, in this section where Jesus is entering into Jerusalem, this is where he takes time to call attention to the widow and her two mites. Look how great she is. She gave all that she had. Jesus saw what everybody else would overlook. And they were all impressed with the temple, but Jesus was not. They were all impressed with the big gifts, but Jesus was not. Jesus was focused on the heart. And man, what a great lesson. In chapters 14 and 15, Jesus is the servant who gives his life. Mark now really slows down. This is when things really move slow because Jesus, he takes time to really linger here. He takes time to show Jesus is anointed at Bethany by Mary. And that anointing was an anointing for his burial. He zeroes in on Judas agreeing to betray him. He deliberately walks through how Jesus observes the Passover with his disciples, how he institutes the Lord's Supper. He prays in Gethsemane. He's betrayed and how he's arrested. How he is falsely accused. He even includes how Peter denied him. It's interesting, Mark makes reference to the young man who flees at this moment and how Peter denies in this moment. And Peter and Mark are the ones working together on this gospel. Tell me that the Bible was written by men. And I'll tell you that no man would ever write the things that these men write about themselves unless they were inspired by God. He slows down and shows the soldiers mocking him. He wanted the Romans to know that they had a part in this. He spends time on Pilate's condemnation. He spends time on the crucifixion of Christ and then how he died and was buried. Jesus prays, Not my will but thine be done. This is the prayer of a servant. Jesus cries, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? What is he doing here? He's the servant who's giving his life a ransom. He is paying and bearing the judgment of our sin. And then the first message at the cross is the Roman centurion saying, Truly this man was the Son of God. Isn't that amazing that the Roman is the one that declared that at the cross? This is an especially meaningful confession in Mark. Because those Roman readers would have sat up and said, Hey, I know we mocked him, but we also proclaimed him. And there would have been many who would have confessed the truth. Mark chapter 16, we see that Jesus rises in victory. I want to just linger on this for just a second because, and we'll be done. But don't miss this, because here is a here's a point of contention. We see the resurrection, and it's clearly laid out for us in chapter 16. But many modern English translations make a note that after chapter 9, or after verse number 8, the chapter ends. And uh the reason they do that is because in several manuscripts that were found, verses 9 through the end of the chapter were not included. But I don't want to get into the weeds on this, but we have a wealth of riches. We have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to evidence for the Word of God, with all the texts and all the manuscripts that we have. But over 1,600 Greek manuscripts include verse 9 all the way through. Two did not, so many translations omit that or leave a footnote that it's not to be included. However, even early church fathers give testimony, like uh Aranius, who wrote in the late second century, quotes from Mark 16, 19 and identifies it as being from Mark's gospel. What's important about that? Well, he was quoting from that way before the Vaticanus and Synaticus were written. So even though they were quote unquote older manuscripts, you have older evidence of people in the early church quoting from this passage of scripture as part of the Bible. One of the things that gets people confused, and why I think some modern translations want to take that out is because in this passage of scripture it says, verse number 16, he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved. So some believe that, well, wait a minute, that's a contradiction because a person has to be saved and baptized. But read the rest of the verse. But he that believeth not shall not be or shall be damned. He doesn't say, and he that believeth not and is not baptized. Baptism was not a requirement of salvation. It was just always assumed that a person who got saved would be baptized. This would have been a really important text because notice what Jesus says here, and these are the signs that follow them that believe in verse 17, in my name shall they cast out devils, they shall speak with new tongues, they shall take up serpents, they shall drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them, they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover. This is not a prescription of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. This is a this is a stamp of apostle authority to the Romans who are like, these people are speaking in weird languages, and people are getting saved, and that guy, Paul, picked up a snake and it bit him, and he didn't die. And these people are doing all kinds of things that we've never heard of before, and it seems a little bit weird. And Mark is writing to the Roman reader saying, These are the signs that followed those men who were with Jesus, those apostolic gifts that were given to those apostles as signs to the Jews. These are sign gifts. By the way, you've got to compare scripture with scripture. Romans chapter, or 1 Corinthians chapter 1 says that the Jews require a sign. The Greeks' wisdom, the Jews require a sign. Then he says in chapter 14, tongues were for a sign. So who required a sign? The Jewish people required a sign. What were tongues? Tongues were given as a sign. Why? Not to them who believe, but to those who believe not. So tongues are not something that are to be used in the church to convince another believer that you have the Spirit of God. Tongues were used to proclaim the gospel to those who did not believe. And tongues were languages that were used in the apostolic times. And so there are people who thought, well, man, this is a little bit tricky, and it seems like it's going to be kind of contradictory. We'll just exclude it. But the point of Romans chapter 16 is it didn't end with the disciples in fear. It ended with the disciples in victory and assured and sent out with a mission to go preach the Word of God in power. That's how it ends. Amen? Okay, that's the Gospel of Luke. Or Mark. I was going to say Luke. Luke will not be a repeat of that because we're going to look at Luke a little bit differently. So be here for the Gospel of Luke next week.