Today, I am reading and commenting on Mark 8-9.

When Jesus told the crowds (and His disciples) that anyone who wants to be His disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow Him, they did not yet understand that He would die on a cross.  Even His disciples did not yet comprehend that He would die.  On the other hand, they had a much better understanding about the horrors of crucifixion than we do.  We need to understand what Jesus is saying here.  We need to be willing to suffer in order to follow Jesus.  An author of fiction whose books I enjoy had one of her characters create a paraphrase of what Jesus says about gaining the world and losing our soul which sheds light on what Jesus said here.  The character said, “There is no value in gaining your heart’s desire if you have to give up your heart in the process.”  While there is much more to what Jesus says here, that statement gave me new insight into the meaning of what Jesus says here.  If we are willing to do whatever it takes to get things, or to experience pleasure, we will allow that which makes us to be destroyed and we will become empty shells.  On the other hand, if we are willing to sacrifice everything we are in order to make the world a better place for others, we will become that which death cannot destroy.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus

Today, I am reading and commenting on Mark 6-7.

I am going t write about when the Pharisees confronted Jesus about the fact that His disciples did not follow their tradition of washing their hands before they ate.  In response Jesus calls them hypocrites for allowing children to get out of caring for their parents by dedicating their assets to God.  He goes on to explain that nothing outside of a person defiles them.  We are defiled by what comes out of our hearts.  We are not defiled by what we eat, or by what we touch, not even by what others do to us.  We are defiled by what we think, which leads to what we do.  What has happened to us does not justify us doing evil.  We can decide to do good, even when others have done us wrong.  Or, we can decide to do evil.  It is entirely our choice, we can allow God’s Spirit to transform our suffering into good, or we can allow our suffering to transform us into a monster.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus

Today, I am reading and commenting on Mark 4-5.

Mark recounts two parables concerning the sowing of seed by a farmer in today’s passage.  In the first one, the Parable of the Sower, Jesus explains to His disciples that “the farmer” sows the word, some of it is heard by receptive hearts and some is heard by unreceptive hearts.  In the second one, the Parable of the Growing Seed, Jesus does not explain it at all.  However, I think we can conclude that the seed in the second one is the word of God, just as it is in the first parable.  Which brings us to who is the farmer in each of these parables?  Sometimes we conclude that the farmer in the first parable is God.  This seems to make sense, since people are the soil on which the seed is sown.  However, in the second parable, the farmer cannot be God because it says that the farmer does not know how the seed sprouts and grows.  Yet, we believe that God knows everything, so the farmer must be those who speak the Gospel to others.  And that makes sense of the second parable.  We do not know how the seed which we plant grows and bears fruit in the hearts of others, but we can watch it happen.  I believe that we are to conclude that we are the farmer in both parables.  This changes the lesson we should take from the first parable.  Instead of spending time worrying about what sort of soil we are, we should busy ourselves spreading the seed which is the word of God.  And since we do not know how that seed will sprout and grow, we should not spend much time worrying about what sort of soil we are spreading it on.

I want to note that we should spend a little bit of time thinking about what sort of soil we are spreading God’s word on, not because we should avoid “wasting our time” spreading it on unproductive soil.  Rather, we should consider the type of soil on which the word of God falls in order to decide what other action we should take.  If the soil is god, then we should stand aside and allow the crop to grow, perhaps adding a little fertilizer, or watering it a bit, but primarily making sure we don’t trample on the crop which is growing.  However, if the seed has fallen among thorns, we should strive to help the recipient pull those thorns so that the crop can grow without being choked.  If the seed has fallen on rocky soil, we should seek to work with the recipient to remove the rocks and to fortify the soil.  Finally, if the soil has fallen on hard ground, we should seek ways to break up the ground and make it receptive to the word that perhaps another coming after us will sow.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus

Today, I am reading and commenting on Mark 1-3.

I am not sure how many points I am going to make about today’s passage.  The first point I want to make is that Jesus went into the synagogues and taught in many villages throughout Galilee.  This suggests to me that He had some recognized training as a Rabbi.  It seems to me unlikely that they would have just allowed a random individual to show up on the Sabbath and begin to teach.  Then when He did teach, He “taught as one who had authority, not as the teachers of the Law.”  I know when I was young the sense I got from that was that He taught by making declarations about what God’s will was.  However, I learned a few years ago that, in the first century, most Jewish rabbis taught by quoting from the writings, and sometimes oral teachings, of authoritative rabbis who had preceded them.  So, I have come to understand that Jesus taught by appealing to the Scripture and explaining what it meant.  He did not rely on what some other authority said the passage meant.  He read the passage and said, “This is what it means.”  The thing about doing that is that, since He was not appealing to some authority for His interpretation, His interpretation had to be one which people could agree with when they compared it to what the passage actually said.  This contrasts with many religions which have arisen since Jesus where the “prophet” declares that God has given him, or her, a revelation which supersedes the previous Scripture.  There is one more thing I want to note about Jesus preaching with authority.  While Mark seems to indicate that Jesus taught from the Scripture which the Jews already had without introducing His own, He also links Jesus teaching with authority to the authority He demonstrated by driving out demons.  Jesus did not need to depend on the authority of others in interpreting Scripture because He demonstrated that His interpretation was consistent with God’s will by driving out demons and healing the sick.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I have created a Patreon page for those who would like to support me in writing these blog posts every day: https://patreon.com/AttilaSoldus

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Mark 14-16.

I was going to write about Judas, or about Peter, or perhaps Judas and Peter.  Then I read through the ending of Mark, which appears to be chapter 18, verse 8.  I was going to ignore verse 9 through the end, because that appears to be a later addition.  However, after some thought about how I understand the Bible, and God’s power, I decided to write what I thought about Mark ending with verse 8, then a bit about the rest.  When the women were heading to the tomb early Sunday morning, they were worrying about how they would roll aside the stone in order to get to Jesus’ body to finish the burial preparations.  In a way, they were praying to be able to give their last respects to someone they dearly loved.  God answered that prayer, but not in a way which bore any resemblance to  what they had hoped for.  In fact, God’s answer to their prayer was so much better than what they were thinking that they did not make the connection.  As a result, they were frightened and fled.  They were coming to Jesus’ tomb to say good bye to Him, because they believed He was dead and that they would not see Him again.  Instead, they found Jesus’ body gone and someone who told them that He was risen.  Mark tells us that the women fled and told no one.

Which brings me to the “add-on” of verse nine to the end.  It appears that later scribes who copied the Gospel of Mark felt that this ending left us hanging with no explanation of what came next.  So, they added this bit which contains summations of information from other Gospels.  Now, I had decided, after some thought, that we should consider this addition as the canon, as authoritative, because it has been copied as part of the Gospel of Mark for so long.  I believe in God’s power to maintain the accuracy of the Bible.  Therefore, if this addition did not contain material which God considered important for guide us in following His will, He would have arranged for it to be removed.  Today, as I was putting my thoughts together, I discovered that this addition to the Gospel of Mark goes back to at least the Second Century A.D..  Which means it was likely included by people who knew witnesses to Jesus’ life.  And that brings me to what we need to learn from this addition.  Jesus told His Disciples, and through them us, that signs would accompany those who believed in Him.  I am going to look at one of those signs which Jesus mentions here: they will pick up snakes with their hands.  Some people make a ritual out of following this, but I think it refers more to what happened to Paul after he was shipwrecked.  Paul did not purposefully pick up a venomous snake, but when he did so and was bitten, it did not harm him.  In the same way, we should follow God’s direction without spending time fearing a dangerous place, or even a dangerous action.  That does not mean we do not take danger into account.  It just means that we do not let danger stop us from doing what the Spirit has directed us to do.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Mark 12-13.

I am going to try linking the accounts of the three questions asked of Jesus in today’s passage.  These stories come in the context of the Jewish teachers of the law and other leaders seeking a way to arrest Jesus without inflaming the crowds.  So, the first question was intended to either get Jesus to say something which would allow them to get the Romans to arrest Him, or alienate the crowds.  If He declared that Jewish Law, the Law of Moses, forbade paying tax to Caesar, they could accuse Him of insurrection to the Romans.  On the other hand, if He said that the tax to Caesar was legitimate under Jewish Law, they would have been able to present Him to the crowds as a stooge for the Romans.  Jesus avoided both of these while pointing out to the crowd that the hypocrisy of those who had tried to trap Him.  Then the Sadducees tried a different trap.  They thought they had found a contradiction between the Law of Moses and belief in the resurrection of the dead.  Jesus pointed out the “easy out” on this and that they did not believe in resurrection because they did not believe that even God could bring the dead back to life.  The final questioner was honestly interested in Jesus’ answer.  And because the questioner was honest in seeking to understand what Jesus taught, Jesus gave him a sincere, honest answer.  Not that Jesus’ other answers were not honest and sincere, it’s just that this last answer did not include any condemnation of the questioner.  Each of the answers teach us important lessons about our God and our faith.  However, taken together these three answers from Jesus teach us how to answer those who question our beliefs.  If they are looking to understand then we should answer them honestly and with respect.  On the other hand, if they are asking in order to trap or  trick us we should answer with shrewdness and wit.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Mark 10-11.

It is interesting the things which we almost never notice.  In today’s passage I have never before noticed that the rich man in today’s passage fell to his knees before he asked Jesus his question.  For that matter, I don’t think I have ever heard anyone comment upon that fact.  It adds a bit of nuance to several elements of the story.  My first thought was that it makes his walking away from Jesus even more stark.  But, it also puts a new look on Jesus’ response about being called “good”.  There are two possible explanations for the man falling to his knees before Jesus.  First, it could have been an expression of sincere supplication.  Second, it could have been an effort to put on a show of sincere supplication.  In the first case, it makes it much sadder that the man was unwilling to give up his wealth and follow Jesus.  In the second case, it suggests that the man came to Jesus to ask the question in order to appear righteous.  The more I think about this incident the more I am convinced that the man was posturing more than he was truly seeking guidance.  In which case, it makes more clear the point which Jesus was making when He asked why the man called Him good.  The man approached Jesus with an appearance of worshipful supplication.  Jesus points out that only God deserves such a worshipful approach.  I want to highlight one other thing about this because Muslims often use this exchange as evidence that Jesus denied that He was God.  In fact, I think this passage does the exact opposite.  By asking why the man called Him good, Jesus is highlighting that when people called Him good they were acknowledging His divinity.  This same reasoning applies to those today who want to say that Jesus was a good teacher but not divine.  Jesus said that only God is good.  Therefore if you call Him a good teacher you cannot also say that He is not God.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Mark 8-9.

Whenever I read Mark’s account of Jesus healing the blind man at Bethsaida I wonder why he felt the need to include the part about Jesus having to touch the man’s eyes twice.  Today it occurred to me that while this actually happened it is also a metaphor for how so many of us come to know God.  Sometimes we are blind to God’s will for us until we ask Jesus to touch us, or, more likely, until someone asks for us.  However, sometimes we still only see blurrily, such that people look like trees walking.  In those cases, we need Jesus to touch us again, so that we might clearly see God’s will.  I was reading the passage again to see what else I wanted to write about today when I realized that Peter’s proclamation that Jesus was the Messiah immediately followed this story.  Mark’s account of that sort of reflects the above lesson.  First, Jesus asks His disciples who people say that He is, then He asks them who they say that He is.  The answers they gave to the first question reflected what those who had been touched once saw, but they, who had been touched repeatedly by Jesus, saw more clearly.  Let’s not settle for blurred vision.  Instead, let us walk with Jesus daily so that He may make our vision clear.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Mark 6-7.

I want to start by commenting on an interesting literary trick which Mark uses here.  I have noticed it before, but nevertheless it still works on my every time.  He tells us that Jesus sent the Twelve out two by two to preach, heal the sick, and drive out demons.  Then he writes about how, some time earlier, Herod had beheaded John the Baptist before writing about how Jesus debriefed the Twelve upon their return leading into the account of feeding the five thousand.  By interjecting the account of Herod beheading John, Mark causes us to feel that a significant amount  of time passed between Jesus’ time in Nazareth and the feeding of the five thousand.  Of course the thing we also miss with this is that the Twelve had just returned from performing miracles which amazed them when they were reluctant to feed the five thousand.  They failed to make the connection between the wonders they had just performed over the course of many days by the power of the God who had given the Israelites manna in the wilderness and feeding a crowd of people.  How often do we fail to make the connection between the power God has demonstrated in our lives and His ability to address the need in front of us?

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Mark 4-5.

I want to comment today on something Mark quoted Jesus as saying early in this passage.  He told His disciples that He taught using parables because they had been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but that those on the outside would “be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!”  Then a little later He told them that whatever is hidden is meant to be disclosed.  Which He followed by telling them to consider what they hear carefully because whoever has will be given more, and whoever does not have even what they have will be taken.  So, we need to listen carefully to what Jesus teaches.  Those who choose to misconstrue what He teaches will find it ever harder to understand later.  Yet, if we strive to understand His teaching, we will be able to learn it ever more clearly.  

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.