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

Pray To Stay

He answered and said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written:

This people honors Me with their lips,
But their heart is far from Me.
And in vain they worship Me,
Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.
  -- Mark 7:6-7

This response from Jesus comes out of a story of washing, as in traditional washing handed down and policed by the Pharisees and scribes. The Pharisees had asked why the disciples following Jesus had not washed their hands before eating bread. The disciples were not dirty in the way of sanitation, but unclean by the traditions. Jesus named them hypocrites and told of a fulfilled prophecy of Isaiah, vain worship and man-made traditions for doctrine. How did they accomplish this? Lip service to God and hearts that were far from Him. 

Pray to stay with Jesus,

Bucky

The Healer

Wherever He entered, into villages, cities, or the country, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged Him that they might just touch the hem of His garment. And as many as touched Him were made well. Mark 6:56

By this point in His ministry, Jesus can no longer slip into a place unnoticed. The people of every place had heard of His healing and they ran to bring to Him all of their sick and lame. That certainly is a need for the moment in this life, but what did they hear from Him? Did anyone accept the words of life that He brought? Are we any better? Or do we run to Jesus in prayer when something hurts only to forget about Him when things go well for us.

I wonder sometimes if it was easier for those people to see Jesus as SuperNurse, healer of all who touch the hem of His garment, than as the Savior of the sinners or even Messiah. We desire His instant healing today, but what we need is His salvation.

Rejoice in patience, He returns,

Bucky