ResponsiveReiding

From Mark 10:13-16 / Child-LIKE vs Child-ISH – It is not childishness which is being lauded here, but the ease with which children believe those in authority. If we recognize Jesus’ authority and like children accept His Word as true and believe it wholeheartedly – how wonderfully easy an entrance into the Kingdom is. And, we need to remember that children can enter the Kingdom as well as adults. Why would we exclude them from exposure to Christ and to His blessing? Are they not in need too? Can they not believe? Let them come! Methinks there is a good argument here for keeping children in the “adult” portion of Church services. As a former pew-rat myself, I can tell you that exposure to the Word preached and taught, even well above my level at the time, did not return to The Master void. It built in to me the words, concepts, songs, truths and worldview of Zion. Children get sun tans the same as adults when exposed to the sun. So let us expose them regularly to The Son.

From Mark 10:2-12 – God Hates Divorce / In this portion and its companion in Matt. 5, Jesus’ enemies tried to trap Him by asking a question a certain way. They saw the Law as giving a loophole for getting out of an undesirable marriage. Jesus tells them flat out – if your heart is so hard that you would divorce your wife so you can be with someone else – you’re an adulterer and divorce is not an option. Divorce is there to give one whose spouse has broken the marriage covenant – relief, not as a tool to satisfy one’s lust. So in Isa. 50 and Jer. 3, we see that God even divorced His people because of their infidelity. It is the hardness of heart that breaks the marriage covenant which makes divorce a remedy for the aggrieved in some cases that is behind Mal. 2’s “God hates divorce.” Hardness of heart that can lead us to even use God’s Word to justify our sin. How we need to guard against it.

From Mark 10:1 – If we gather to Him, He will teach us. If not, we will remain ignorant of Him. Prayer is our gathering unto Him, and His Word is Him speaking to us. And oh how we need taught – for it seems as though our wicked hearts and minds do not retain the words of Life. How little we seem to grasp of His person, His work, His plans and His purposes. As was His custom the text says – He taught them. And Mark 6:34 says this was especially His response to seeing the people as “sheep without a shepherd.” Over and over we need to hear.
Teach us your glories Lord, that we might hallow your name;
Teach us your love that we might be conquered by it;
Teach us your will that it might be done in these clods of dirt called our souls, in earth, as it is in Heaven;
Teach us of Christ Jesus such that we might be full and satisfied;
Teach us of your mercy and grace that it might flow from us as freely as it does from you;
Teach how to walk in the steps of Jesus, delivered from the Enemy, abandoning all sin and following Him in righteousness.
Teach us precious Savior.

From Mark 9:43-50 – Who’s the Greatest? – This passage rounds out the discussion in vss. 33-37, and the Disciples arguing about who among them was the greatest. When we are minded that way, inevitably we will marginalize the lowly who are His. And how the Savior hates pride, arrogance and elitism in the Church. Hence His drastic words: If your hand brings you to sin – IN THIS – treating one of these lowly ones poorly; if your eye sins – IN THIS – looking upon these down your nose; if your foot leads you to sin – IN THIS – walking differently before these lowly ones – beware! You are no longer salt in this world – you now have imbibed the spirit of the world. One of the worst things Christians, and especially Christian leaders can do, is to create in anyone else a sense of elitism or superiority in God’s Kingdom – or, make them victims of our own elitism. If we strive for recognition or rank, we will infect others around us, either inducing them to follow our lead, or discriminating against them. Fight this sin and the tendency toward it at all costs.

a. Never work for it (the hand in vs. 43).

b. Never walk toward it (the foot in 45).

c. Never set your eye upon it (vs 47).

It is a damning evil. Rank, rots the soul.

From Mark 9:38-41 / Unity, Liberty and Charity – One of the sad carryovers from our life before Christ, is how tribal we like to be. It is part of our fallen nature to divide into groups, even within the Church – and to imagine we have the inside track to the best form of Christianity. J. C. Ryle notes on this passage: “Men of all branches of Christ’s Church are apt to think that no good can be done in the world, unless it is done by their own party and denomination. They are so narrow-minded, that they cannot conceive the possibility of working on any other pattern but that which they follow. They make an idol of their own peculiar ecclesiastical machinery, and can see no merit in any other.” Ryle, J. C. Expository Thoughts on Mark. William Hunt, 1859, p. 190. Make no mistake, if men err on the person and work of Christ, we have an indelible dividing line. At the same time, those who cling to the Christ of the Bible, are our brothers, irrespective of differences that may still be significant. The ancient motto wrongly attributed to St. Augustine – but rightly ascribed to the Lutheran Rupertus Meldenius (circa 1627) but first taught by Jesus here, holds true: “In essentials – UNITY, In non-essentials – LIBERTY, In all things – CHARITY.”

From Mark 9:33-37 / Swept up – It is not about how great we are, but about how we receive all who are His, no matter how humble and still in need of maturity they may be. This issue will be followed up by the account of rebuking an exorcist because he “would not follow” them. The question was – is he following Christ! Is he doing His work and glorifying His name? ‎Mark expands Luke’s version by implying that Jesus sweeps the little guy into His arms as He talks about “receiving”. We cannot just say they are Christians in name only, we must embrace them. Even when that requires we discipline and correct. And, it paints the grandest, sweetest picture of all of us in our salvation – He has swept us up into His arms of grace, when we were so dull of hearing, immature of heart, and unable to do anything for Him at all. Just little children. Beloved by a condescending God, robed in human flesh.

From Mark 9:30-32 / Things of First Importance – After Jesus’ transfiguration, and the failure of the Disciples to free the demonized boy, one might have expected Jesus to conduct a class on being glorified, or demonology. But no. As He draws His disciples alone to talk of things which are highest on His list of priorities, it is a focus upon His death, burial and resurrection. And then I see how they respond to this. It confused them. And they were afraid to ask Him about it. And I wonder, what great things do I NOT know about Christ, about the wonder of His death, burial and resurrection, because – for whatever reason, I am afraid to ask Him for clarity? We do not automatically assume these are of the greatest importance. And so I pray today: Forgive me Father. I fail so here. I know so little of Jesus, because I fail to explore Him as I desperately need to. The wonder of His person and work fail to capture my attention as they ought. Fill me with the wonder of – Jesus Christ, my crucified and risen Lord.

From Mark 9:14-29 – A Grieving Savior / In vs. 19, Jesus’ grief over this situation is palpable. The question is, is Jesus’ grief here: a. an expression of grief over the Disciple’s inability to cast the demon out; b. the heated response of the crowd in the aftermath of their failure; c. the state of affairs among fallen mankind that made the demonization of the boy and his misery possible in the first place – or all or some combination of these? And to see this in such brutal clarity after just having been with Moses and Elijah, and tasting of His own true glory once again – only to be thrust back into the midst of this sin-cursed world. What a grief that must have been to Him. But if I had to settle on one above the others, it would be His grief over the state of the boy – and how long He must tolerate the ravages of sin on His image bearers. How grateful I am He grieves over what sin has done to we who were made in His image. He grieves with us in our groaning in the experience of sin’s aftermath. And He alone will, be the one to satisfy the Father’s justice on our behalf, that “sorrow and sighing shall flee away” (Isa. 35:10) someday.

From Mark 9:9-13 / Back to the Mountain – We could not have a more timely caution here from Jesus, than if He had gone on television today and spoken it: DO NOT – DO NOT be as concerned with such prophecies regarding Elijah and other so-called “end times” details. Consider first and foremost the coming of the Son of Man and His rejection by the Jews. When Elijah came (both originally and in antitype in John the Baptizer) he was persecuted (13). Luke 1:17 ties the two together. But these stand only as types, shadows and signals of the Christ and His persecution. Do not make the shadow the substance. Don’t make the paperboys more important than the news. So Jesus could go on to as if to say: You did not understand that the fulfillment of this prophecy was in John the Baptizer, for the same reason you do not understand the Messiah must come first as a suffering servant to die, before He comes in His glory – because these are not simple, one-time events, but multi-layered types, shadows and multi-faceted things which require great discernment. And they all find their fulfillment in Jesus. Back to the mountain – “Listen to Him!”

From Mark 9:1-8 – “Listen to Him” / To the Jewish mind, there was no Old Testament figure higher than Moses. He led the people out of Egypt, received the Law on Mt. Sinai and was the premier figure as the mediator of God’s revelation to His People. And Elijah was considered the dean of the prophets. These two stood as the epitome of Old Testament authority. But when Jesus is seen with them, His glory so eclipses theirs, that the Father declares – “This is my beloved Son, listen to Him.” They were messengers and representatives – He, is God in human flesh. We cannot fully know what the Law was all about, nor the prophets, until Jesus is in His rightful place as supreme over all. And so we must read our Old Testament in the light of Him: “For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” (2 Cor. 4:6) There’s no going back to even a quasi-Judaism. Christ has come to fulfill all.