Sunday, November 04, 2007

Mark 6

1 - 6 The Rejection of Jesus at Nazareth - When Jesus preaches at the synagogue in his hometown, he is rejected. I just went to my 20th high school reunion, and I saw how hard it is for people (myself included) to break free of their preconceived notions of people.

6 - 13 The Mission of the Twelve - Jesus sends his disciples out two by two & gives them authority over unclean spirits. They should take nothing except for a staff (no bread, no bag, no money in their belts) Wear sandals & 2 tunics. If anyone refuses to see them, "shake the dust off your feet" as a testimony against them. They went out and cast out many demons and annointed the sick.


14 - 29 The Death of John the Baptist - King Herod hears of Jesus. He had imprisoned John because John had told him it was unlawful for Herod to have marry his sister-in-law Herodias. On Herod's birthday, he had given a party and Herodias's daughter (Salome, according to Josephus) danced. Herod tells the girl, "Ask me for whatever I want, and I will give it). She asks her mom, Herodias, who wants the Head of John the Baptist on a platter. This upsets Herod, but he is too weak to protest. He gives the girl the head and the girl gives it to her mother.

30 - 44 Feeding the Five Thousand - Jesus shares 5 loaves and 2 fish with 5000 people.


45 - 52 Jesus Walks on Water - That night they are crossing the sea to Bethsaida. In the evening his disciples see him walking on the sea in a bad wind. He tells them not to be afraid, gets in the boat and the wind ceases.


53 - 56 Healing the Sick in Gennesaret - He is recognized and many rush out to be healed. All who touch his cloak are healed.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Jesus preaches in Nazareth
People in Jesus' hometown disregard him because he's still the "carpenter" to them. I certainly agree, Karlton, about the reunion idea and it shows what we can miss out on by having these biases. No one in Nazareth can say, "I heard Christ preach!".

Jesus bestowed power to drive out demons and to heal the sick on the disciples.

John indicates that Herod "liked to listen to John" (20) and was "distressed" (25) at having to kill him just to save face before his dinner guests.

The disciples returned to Jesus to give an AAR. Jesus wanted to go away privately to counsel and rest. People saw them leaving and gathered where they were heading. 34 "Jesus had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd" and taught them. It got late and they were in a remote place so they were going to have to send someone to get food. They collected 5 loaves and 2 fishes from the crowd. When everyone had finished there were 12baskets of "left overs".

Jesus sends the disciples across the lake to continue preaching. The wind picked up against them. Jesus began to walk across the lake after them, almost passed them, then got in the boat with them. When he got into the boat the wind died. It was before dawn so they thought he was a ghost on the water.

QUESTION:
52 The disciples didn't understand about the loaves, their hearts were hardened.
What should they (and we) learn from this event?