TPC Connections

Sermon Notes

Mark: The Right Now Gospel
Pt. 13
“The Slow-learning Disciples”

Mark 8 “In those days, the multitude being very great and having nothing to eat, Jesus called His disciples to Him and said to them, 2 ‘I have compassion on the multitude, because they have now continued with Me three days and have nothing to eat. 3 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.’”
4 Then His disciples answered Him, “How can one satisfy these people with bread here in the wilderness?”
Now here we have Pete and repeat. Just two chapters earlier we had the identical situation. A vast, hungry crowd following Jesus, and Jesus suggesting the disciples feed them. And the disciples, once again, bring the same response–“How can we possibly pull that off?”
And then Jesus asks them the same question he asked in Mark 6:38:
5 He asked them, “How many loaves do you have?”
And they said, “Seven.”
And once again, Jesus brought order to the crowd by having them sit down. And again, he repeats the familiar pattern of taking, blessing, breaking, and giving of the bread:
6 So He commanded the multitude to sit down on the ground. And He took the seven loaves and gave thanks, broke them and gave them to His disciples to set before them; and they set them before the multitude. 7 They also had a few small fish; and having blessed them, He said to set them also before them.
And once again, a mighty miracle of multiplication takes place:
8 So they ate and were filled, and they took up seven large baskets of leftover fragments. 9 Now those who had eaten were about four thousand.
Having fed them to the full,
“And He sent them away, 10 immediately got into the boat with His disciples, and came to the region of Dalmanutha.”
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On arriving to Dalmanutha, which was in the region of Magdala, the predictable Pharisees are waiting for him with a request:
11 “Then the Pharisees came out and began to dispute with Him, seeking from Him a sign from heaven, testing Him.”
Now, Jesus had shown endless signs of his Messiah-ship through his miracles. But the Pharisees were asking for a particular kind of sign. They wanted a sign like the standing still of the sun and moon in the times of Joshua; or of manna raining down from heaven as in the times of Moses; or of thunder and lightning that accompanied the giving of the law.
Their requests deeply grieved the Lord:
12 “But He sighed deeply in His spirit…”
“And he sighed deeply in his spirit”—is very strong language. The Lord’s heart was deeply affected at their wickedness and hypocrisy. The word “spirit” here is taken as the seat of the emotions, passions, affections. These brief glimpses into the interior of the Redeemer’s heart are more precious than rubies. Essentially, the condition of the Pharisaic heart, which prompted this desire for a fresh sign, went to His very soul.
12b “and (Jesus) said, ‘Why does this generation seek a sign? Assuredly, I say to you, no sign shall be given to this generation.'”
Now, Matthew gives more information on the Lord’s response:
Matt 12:39-42 “39 But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. 40 For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”
In other words, since they are unmoved by His miracles, the Lord’s resurrection from the dead will be the definitive, ultimate sign for them!
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Beware of the Leaven of the Pharisees and Herod
13 And He left them (the Pharisees), and getting into the boat again, departed to the other side. 14 Now the disciples had forgotten to take bread, and they did not have more than one loaf with them in the boat. 15 Then He charged them, saying, “Take heed, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.”
16 And they reasoned among themselves, saying, “It is because we have no bread.”
The disciples assumed Jesus was chiding them for being reduced to one loaf of bread, and utterly missed his warning to avoid the false teaching of the Pharisees and Herod. Exasperated, Jesus fires off 9 questions in rapid succession:
17 But Jesus, being aware of it, said to them, “Why do you reason because you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive nor understand? Is your heart still hardened? 18 Having eyes, do you not see? And having ears, do you not hear? And do you not remember? 19 When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of fragments did you take up?”
They said to Him, “Twelve.”
20 “Also, when I broke the seven for the four thousand, how many large baskets full of fragments did you take up?”
And they said, “Seven.”
21 So He said to them, “How is it you do not understand?”
Summing the 9 questions up, they reveal the Lord’s frustration with their slowness in learning. After two mighty, miraculous feedings of the multitudes, they still fretted over having just one loaf of bread, as if the Lord could not have taken care of them!
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Next, Jesus heals yet another blind man and again his method is different from before!
22 Then He came to Bethsaida; and they brought a blind man to Him, and begged Him to touch him. 23 So He took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the town. And when He had spit on his eyes and put His hands on him, He asked him if he saw anything.
24 And he looked up and said, “I see men like trees, walking.”
25 Then He put His hands on his eyes again and made him look up. And he was restored and saw everyone clearly. 26 Then He sent him away to his house, saying, “Neither go into the town, nor tell anyone in the town.”
Now, we mentioned last time how Jesus refused to be tied down to any particular methodology but used great variety in performing his miracles. Last time he had spit on the ground, made mud of it, and placed it in the man born blind’s eyes. This time he literally spat on his eyes.
And in this case for the first and only time in the gospels the miracle Jesus performs happens in stages, not fully and immediately. At first the blind man sees people like trees walking. His vision is only partially restored. It requires a second touch from the Lord.
What of this? I believe here we have an illustration of spiritual blindness being healed in stages. When we first hear the gospel we see a glimmer of the truth–Jesus is the Savior. The gospel light penetrates our darkened soul and we, based on that truth, turn to Christ. But as time goes on and we grow, our spiritual vision becomes more and more clear. What we at first only caught a glimpse of becomes brighter and brighter, as the verse says:
“The way of the righteous is like the first gleam of dawn, which shines ever brighter until the full light of day.”–Pr 4:18
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And as a living example, we see next how Simon Peter is growing into brighter and brighter revelation of who Jesus was and is!
27 Now Jesus and His disciples went out to the towns of Caesarea Philippi; and on the road He asked His disciples, saying to them, “Who do men say that I am?”
28 So they answered, “John the Baptist; but some say, Elijah; and others, one of the prophets.”
29 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?”
Peter answered and said to Him, “You are the Christ.”
30 Then He strictly warned them that they should tell no one about Him.”
Matthew’s gospel gives us a fuller account:
Matt 16:17-18 “Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. 18 And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.”
The Catholic church has interpreted Jesus’s words to Peter as meaning that Peter would be the rock upon which the church was built. What is called the Petrine succession comes from that belief. The Petrine succession is the Catholic doctrine that the authority of the pope—the “Bishop of Rome”—comes from Jesus’ direct appointment of Saint Peter as the “rock” on which He would build His Church (Matthew 16:18) and as the one to whom He entrusted the “keys of the Kingdom” (Matthew 16:19, 18:18)
This, it goes on to state that Peter was the first pope, and his ministry and primacy were passed on to his successors as bishops of Rome, forming an unbroken line of apostolic succession. So every pope is continuing the Petrine succession.
But Jesus was not saying that Peter would be the rock upon which His church was built, but rather the revelation Peter had–that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God–would be the rock the church is built on!
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Jesus Predicts His Death and Resurrection
31 And He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32 He spoke this word openly. Then Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him. 33 But when He had turned around and looked at His disciples, He rebuked Peter, saying, “Get behind Me, Satan! For you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.”
Verse 31 contains one of three times Jesus literally predicts his own death and resurrection.
Verses 32-33 show that Peter was still “seeing men as trees walking” regarding his understanding of Jesus’s ultimate purpose to die on the Cross for our sins. He tries dissuading the Lord from his coming suffering and death. Jesus reveals that Satan himself was behind Peter doing this!
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Then the chapter closes out with a call to discipleship:
34 When He had called the people to Himself, with His disciples also, He said to them, “Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. 35 For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it.
Then He asks the question every human being should consider:
36 For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? 37 Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?
38 For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man also will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.”