What do I know with Isaac Carroll
What do I know with Isaac Carroll
Faith Over Formalities: Reading Mark 16 With Clear Eyes
A stone rolled back, an empty tomb, and a message that refuses to be tamed—Mark 16 pulls us into the shock of resurrection and the challenge of what comes next. We walk scene by scene through the chapter, from the women’s dawn visit to the final commission, and then slow down over the knotty parts: manuscript questions around verses 9–20, why early witnesses struggled to recognize Jesus, and how to read the promise of signs without turning faith into a performance.
I share why “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved” should build confidence, not fear. The thief on the cross stands beside Nicodemus as we explore what it means to be born of water and Spirit, and why baptism is an act of obedience that points to a deeper miracle God works in the heart. We also face common pressures head-on—claims that tongues or sensational signs are the ultimate proof of salvation—and hold them up to Galatians 5. The Spirit’s fruit is the steady evidence: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
All of this leads to a simple, freeing center: cling to Christ, keep step with the Spirit, and test every voice by Scripture. Signs mattered in the apostolic witness, and we still pray for God’s power. But the clearest differentiator today is fidelity to the Word and a life that looks like Jesus. If a message veers from Scripture, we name it and walk away. If a teacher’s life grows the fruit of the Spirit, we lean in and learn. Press play for a grounded walk through Mark 16 that swaps anxiety for clarity and performance for obedience. If this study strengthens your faith, subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a review to help others find the show.
May God bless you and lead you always.
Welcome to the podcast. I'm Isaac Carroll, and this is What Do I Know? Alright, in today's Bible study, we are going to be in Mark, the sixteenth chapter, and we're going to begin at verse one. When the Sabbath was passed, Mary Magdalene and married the mother of James in Salem brought spices so that they might go and anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. And they were saying to one another, Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb? And looking up they saw that the stone had been rolled back, and it was very large. And entering the tomb they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed. And he said to them, Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen, and he is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter, he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he has told you. And they went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had seized them. They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. It is believed by many scholars that Mark is the first gospel, the first written account of the life and the ministry of Jesus. And because it's so short, it's believed that the other disciples wrote their accounts to expound on what Mark had written. Now, moving forward, the verses 9 through 11 were excluded from the earliest of manuscripts. And it is believed by some that it was added back after the other gospels were written because they agreed with the account. Alright, saying that, let's continue at verse 9. Now when he rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons. She went and told those who had been with him, as they mourned and wept. But when they heard that he was alive and had been seen by her, they would not believe it. After these things he appeared in another form to two of them as they walked into the country. They went back and they told the rest, but did not believe them. Alright, so this is talking about the road to AMS, where the two disciples were talking as they were walking, and uh a man was walking behind them, and he asked them about what they were speaking about. And they told him, and then it was Jesus telling them, giving them understanding about why Jesus had to die. And they were as they got home, they invited him into their home because it was late, and they said, Let's stay with us for the night. So they came in, and as he was breaking bread, they recognized their eyes were open, and they recognized Jesus, and then he disappeared from their sight. It says, Then their eyes were opened and they recognized Jesus and he disappeared from their sight. You know, no one really recognized Jesus when they first saw him. Mary Magdalene in John 20, verse 14, didn't recognize Jesus. It says, when she said this, she turned and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not recognize that it was Jesus. I kind of believe this is why Mark wrote that he appeared in a different form, because he wasn't recognized. Afterward he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at the table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen. And he said to them, Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe in my name, they will cast out demons, they will speak in new tongues, and they will pick up serpents with their hands, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them. And they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover. All right, let's stop here at verse 18. We come to a point in this gospel where we need to truly understand what is being written. And we need to go through, we need to search scripture to help us define what is being spoken here. Because I've heard a lot of people use these uh to condemn. And I don't understand it. Mark said that Jesus said, Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved. Now, this has made some believe that anybody who was not baptized after they were saved did not make it into heaven. And we know this is not true by the thief on the cross. I mean, why was the thief on the cross added? And we know that he gave his life to Jesus on the cross, so there was no way for him to be baptized afterward. And they say, oh, everybody uses a thief on the cross. Well, of course we use a thief on the cross because it's there, it's written about. It's it's a witness to us for the very purpose to give us understanding. So often we as believers, we get so caught up in legalism. I mean, that's what the Pharisees and the scribes got so messed up in, and why Jesus was so upset with them. Because they there was these all these hoops that they they knew they had to jump through to be perfect or to be in the right standing with God. The Bible teaches us that it we are justified through faith. Let's look at what Jesus says. Jesus was talking to Nicodemus. Uh, you can read about this in John 3. Jesus himself says this to Nicodemus. Truly, truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Now, this must surely be understood as water baptism, right? Or does it? Peter himself puts it like this in 1 Peter 3 21. And this water symbolizes the baptism that now saves you also. Not the removal of dirt from the body, but the pledge of a clear conscience towards God through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. What is God's search? The heart. David says this in Psalms 51, verse 16. For you do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it. You take no pleasure in burnt offerings. The sacrifice of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. John the Baptist said this. He says, I baptize you with water for repentance. But the one who comes after me, who's greater than I, he will baptize you with fire and spirit. Matthew 3, verse 11. Why is it always the body, the physical form that we get so caught up in? Did God come to save your body? We know for a fact that nothing on this earth will inherit heaven. Nothing. How do we know this? We know this by scripture. 1 Corinthians 15 and 50 says this. I tell you this, brothers, flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does a perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold, I tell you a mystery. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. So the body that we have now is not going to go to heaven. It says, Will we give it a new body? One that's not perishable. So why is are we so caught up in the washing of this outer body? If God is so concerned about the inner man, the heart, the water that Jesus is speaking to or speaking of is the new birth. Jesus said this in Nicodemus also. He says, Do not be amazed that I have said this, that you must be born again. The wind blows where it wishes. You hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit. Why don't we let God decide who goes and who doesn't go and concentrate on the gospel? You can wash your body all day long. It's not going to change the inward man. If you do not have the Spirit of God in you, then you're not of God. We need to stop looking at doctrines and start looking at obedience. We need to start looking at faithfulness. We need to start looking at what Jesus done for us so that we, not just we, but all who will believe, will make it into the kingdom of heaven. Yeah, great. Let's make sure everybody dots the I's and crosses the T's. I get that. Wouldn't stop anyone, and I would tell anyone who gets saved that they should, they should be baptized. Why? Because it's an outward sign to the world that you're proclaiming that you believe. But if someone gets in a car accident before they get to the baptismal waters, I do not believe in an instant that God would damn their souls to hell. And if you believe that, we don't know the same God. Alright, I'm gonna get off my soapbox. Alright, let's address a couple other things that was wrote. These signs will accompany those who believe in my name. They will cast out demons and they will speak in new tongues, and they will pick up serpents for their hands. If they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them. Alright. Some believe that if you do not speak in tongues, it's an outward sign that you do not know God. Another one of these legalism. Ah, I get so upset. So I have never spoke in another tongue. Not once. I don't know any other language but the one I was born with. I've tried very hard to learn, but I can't. Does that disqualify me from heaven? Does that show that I don't have the Spirit of God in me? I hope not. God is love, and He says the fruits of the Spirit are faithfulness, long suffering. If if I'm reading it right, nowhere in there does it say the fruit of the Spirit is speaking in new languages. But let's don't ask me, let's ask what the Bible says. Let's read Galatians 5. We'll start in verse 16. So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh craves what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are opposed to each other, so that you do not do what you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. The acts of the flesh are obvious. Sexual immorality, impurity, debauchery, idolatry, and sorcery, hatred, discord, jealousy and rage, rivalries, divisions, factions, and envy, drunkenness and orgies, and things like this. I warn you as I did before, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Again, such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we are led by the Spirit, let's walk in step with the Spirit. Let's not become conceited, provoking and envying one another. I wonder why Paul wrote that. Love. We are asked to love, not to speak in tongues. We're asked to be patient and kind and good and faithful and gentle and to have self-control and stay away from acts of the flesh. We're told to be obedient and to be faithful. This is what it means to be born again when we're led by the Spirit. Alright, let me let me finish this up. Let me continue at verse 19. So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven, and he sat down at the right hand of God, and they went out and they preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by accompanying signs. Alright, that concludes Mark, the 16th chapter and the book of Mark. Accompany signs. I wish today's gospel, I wish today's preachers and evangelists were accompanied by these signs. And God wanted to differentiate his disciples from them. He wanted to show who he approved. When he sent them out, he sent them out with signs, with power. And that's how they were distinguished from others so that they would know who was speaking the truth and who was with God. I wish it was so clear these days. I wished it was. I would pray that things would change and that power would be given back to those who were truly with God. That these signs would be manifested in them and that we could know and we could call out false preachers because the signs would not be with them. But with us, we are given the word. We can all go to it, we can search its words, we can search its knowledge, and we can justify or we can call out truth. When we hear it from someone and it does not align with God's word, then they're a liar, and they're misleading you. If anything I have said ever does not align with God's word, then I am a liar, and you should not listen to me. I believe everything I have said is aligned with God's word, but if you can prove that I have not, then yes. Call me out. Show me where I have failed so that I may repent. But if you cannot, then truly God is with me, and you should heed the words. I'm going to end this one here. We'll be in the Gospel of Luke in our next Bible study. Until then, I love you guys. God bless you. Goodbye.