Reason Together With God

Then He charged them, saying, “Take heed, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.”
And they reasoned among themselves, saying, “It is because we have no bread.”
-- Mark 8:15-16

We have been there where the disciples are in this scriptural moment reasoning among themselves. Sometimes we even do that reasoning among just the self and come up with similar wrong answers. This sort of useless reasoning is why God invited us in Isaiah 1:18 to reason together with Him. His reasoning is what we need most, and He is glad to lead us and take us with Him.

God is our answer, and the answer came down as a man named Jesus,

Bucky

Testing Him

Then the Pharisees came out and began to dispute with Him, seeking from Him a sign from heaven, testing Him. But He sighed deeply in His spirit, and said, “Why does this generation seek a sign? Assuredly, I say to you, no sign shall be given to this generation.”  Mark 8:11-12

Testing the Lord Jesus was a sure sign of their unbelief. But was it even a test Jesus could pass? The Pharisees had heard about the water into wine from Cana. Some were present when Jesus told the paralytic to get up and take his bed. The Pharisees had protested His work healing the blind man on Sabbath. So what sort of sign were they seeking? What could possibly satisfy their hardened hearts? Then of course, God the Son stood before them. Could there be a stronger sign than that? If their unbelief was so strong that they could ignore Jesus the Son, then nothing was what Jesus would give them. He cast no pearls before these faithless swine. 

Grateful we are to God this morning that He gave us faith to believe in His Son,

Bucky

His Compassion Works

I have compassion on the multitude, because they have now continued with Me three days and have nothing to eat. And if I send them away hungry to their own houses, they will faint on the way; for some of them have come from afar. Mark 8:2-3

Jesus could have started with the questions, ones such as we ask so often. Why didn't you prepare? Where is your traveling food? What is the matter with you people? But Jesus saw the problem and expressed His compassion for the hungry mass of people before Him. The multitude isn't quite as large as the last time, but still just as impossible to feed in the normal means available to those there at that moment. We might ask some questions of Jesus too. Why did you draw them so far out into the wilderness? Couldn't you have turned the crowd around yesterday? You may notice that none of the hypothetical questions I have given to 'us' in this story do anyone any good. The compassion of Jesus had solutions, even as He asked His disciples what they were going to do about the problem. His compassion works...at feeding the multitude, teaching the disciples, and preparing lessons for us to come along and learn these centuries later.

So let's learn from Him!

Bucky

Gross Disobedience

Then He commanded them that they should tell no one; but the more He commanded them, the more widely they proclaimed it. And they were astonished beyond measure, saying, “He has done all things well. He makes both the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.” Mark 7:36-37

At the end of a tale of healing, we run into a tale of gross disobedience of our Lord Jesus. It is so far into rebel territory, that as Jesus commands it drives them further into disobeying Him. What horrible wrath of Heaven did He rain down on these rebels? Was it a sin to disobey the Son of God when the very same act would become a great commission after His resurrection? Was Jesus using a reverse psychology trick to get what He wanted? It is rather difficult not to tell of someone who does all things well, just ask any grandparent. This tale does come from a bit of ironic humor. Jesus had just healed a deaf-mute, and then told him to tell no one.

A secret surely is hard to keep!

Bucky

Special Treatment

And she answered and said to Him, “Yes, Lord, yet even the little dogs under the table eat from the children’s crumbs.”
Then He said to her, “For this saying go your way; the demon has gone out of your daughter.” Mark 7:28-29

Why did this Syro-Phoenician woman need special treatment? For explanation, let's take it back a little bit to when each of us were born. We don't recall a thing. Okay, but our mothers know, and they can help us here. If dear Mum had more than one child, she loved each one. She could also tell tales of the differences each baby needed in her care. While similar in needs for feeding, cleaning, and so on, each baby also had its special needs. So what does that have to do with Jesus?

Go back again a little further in time to the meeting of Jesus with Nicodemus one night. Jesus told the Teacher of Israel that he had to be born again. Ah, that sounds like a baby thing. Yes, it does. Jesus is in the business of raising spiritual babies, ones born of the Spirit. And thus, each one may need some special treatment such as the blind man in John 9 or this woman in our scripture for today.

Did your coming to Jesus receive a special treatment?

In Christ alone,

Bucky

Tailor Made

The woman was a Greek, a Syro-Phoenician by birth, and she kept asking Him to cast the demon out of her daughter. But Jesus said to her, “Let the children be filled first, for it is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.” Mark 7:26-27

He held an important authority and she wanted it used to free her daughter. Then Jesus says what to us seems a refusal and an insult all in one. It comes from a short, but curious story in two gospels. It appears on the surface that this Gentile woman must work hard to gain what Jesus had before spread so freely among multitudes. It is another example of how Jesus tailor made each healing to fit what the person needed both physically and spiritually. We do not know why one blind man needed a paste of dirt and spit to heal his sight. Nor are we told why this woman needed to make her request and then do some reasoning with the Lord Jesus to get her daughter released from the demon. In both cases, Jesus did the healing with a little different method than many others.

Your need awaits His tailor made solution; be patient or active, whatever He requires.

Bucky

Did Jesus Just...?

When He had called all the multitude to Himself, He said to them, “Hear Me, everyone, and understand: There is nothing that enters a man from outside which can defile him; but the things which come out of him, those are the things that defile a man. If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear!” Mark 7:14-16

Even His disciples questioned Him away from the crowd. What was He saying about all those dietary laws? Diet remains a debated subject to this day. But Peter had that dream. And Paul addressed the meat offered to idols. And Jesus went on from our passage for today to explain about the stomach pathway and how that food going in does not defile a person. The stirring conclusion our Lord Jesus presented was that while worry over food consumes us, we miss the vile outpouring of our sinful hearts.

And He said, “What comes out of a man, that defiles a man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within and defile a man.” Mark 7:20-23

Phew! What a pile. Wouldn't it be easier to fret about food? Yes, but we are not called to 'easier'.

Bucky