Mark

The new Israel of God, 3:7-19

Opposition from Israel's religious officials now forces Jesus to move from the local synagogue to the countryside and there to preach and heal. Great crowds gather to Jesus from all over Palestine and Mark records the use of a boat as a makeshift pulpit to deal with the increasing number of onlookers. Just by touching Jesus the sick are healed and the possessed exorcized. The demons, probably in an attempt to gain mastery over Jesus, declare their knowledge of him, but Jesus simply silences them and sends them packing. Seeking solitude from the hubbub, Jesus withdraws to the desolate hill-country and there appoints the twelve that they might be with him and assist in preaching the gospel.

v7-8. Mark sets the scene for us. Jesus may be having trouble with Israel's religious officials and increasingly finding himself unwelcome in the local synagogues, but the populous at large still flocks to see him. Mark tells us that Jews from all over Palestine come to see what Jesus is doing.

v9-10. On this occasion, the push of the crowd is so great that the disciples commender a boat for a pulpit. In a rather pointed comment Mark notes the reason for Jesus' popularity. It has little to do with the message he preaches, but the miracles he performs. The people press in to touch him so that they might be healed.

v11-12. The crowd see Jesus as a miracle worker, but when he confronts people who are demon possessed, the demons know very well who they are dealing with - "the Son of God." The demons state who Jesus is in an attempt to get the better of him, a kind of "we know who you are and we have your measure." Of course, they don't, and so Jesus tells them to shut up. Jesus obviously casts them out, although Mark doesn't tell us one way or the other. It's interesting how Jesus often keeps his identify secret; it's as if he wants only those who seek after the truth to find the truth - miracle-seeking crowds will never find the truth.

v13-15. Jesus withdraws to the highlands and from those who have followed him he appoints twelve special disciples, later known as apostles, sent-ones. These twelve are to join with Jesus in full-time ministry. They will be with Jesus and learn from him and will have the authority to proclaim the gospel both in words and signs. The most outstanding sign of the gospel for Jews living in the first century is the disciples' authority over dark powers. v16-19. The twelve, in a sense, represent the twelve tribes of Israel - the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin, and the ten lost tribes. They are the founding members of the New Israel, the new people of God. There is Peter, the rock-man, and his brother Andrew; James and John, the sons of thunder, both probably noisy and bad tempered; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew who is possibly the same person as Levi; James the son of Alphaeus who is possibly the brother of Levi the son of Alphaeus, 2:14, and Thaddeus, known in Luke's gospel as Judas, son of James; The last two being Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot the man of Kerioth.

Have you ever wondered why the first three gospels are so similar? If you have, you're not the only one. Bible scholars have pawed over these three gospels trying to work out the link. The most popular theory for a time was that Matthew wrote his gospel and then Mark wrote his using Matthew as his main source, and then Luke wrote his gospel using Matthew and Mark, along with some extra material he was able to dig up himself. Today, the most popular theory is that Mark wrote his gospel first using his own knowledge of the gospel story and a source document called Q. Then Luke wrote his gospel using Mark, Q and the results of his own research. Finally, Matthew wrote his gospel using Q, Mark, and Luke.

In recent times some Bible scholars have come up with the theory that at the time when the first three gospels were written all the stories and teachings of Jesus were firmly set in an Aramaic oral tradition. Only a small number of people at this time were able to read and write and so information was passed on by story-tellers, teachers who had learnt the information off by heart and were able to teach other by rote so that they could pass it on. The apostles were commissioned by Jesus to be with him, to minister full-time with him, to learn from him and then to go out and communicate what they had learned. The apostles are our founding story-tellers.

If you look closely at the first three gospels they present as a careful arrangement of independent stories and sayings. Many of the Jesus stories take the shape of our fairy stories. Look at the story of Red Riding Hood. The story is memorable, as is the punch line, and most of us can retell it easily. Bible scholars tell us that Jesus sayings, his teachings, were originally in the form of Aramaic poetry, they were metered so they could be easily remembered. So, the apostles, as our founding story-tellers, learnt Jesus teachings, shaped the stories in the telling of them, and this soon became a set tradition in the ever-expanding Christian church.

Of course, as the church expanded and the apostles started to die off, the need arose to document the Jesus story for posterity. This is where our gospel writers come in. The church was increasingly Gentile, rather than Jewish, and the language of the market place was Greek, so our gospel writers translated the Jesus story from Aramaic to Greek. Their care in reproducing the tradition is evident in the similarity of the first three gospels. There are slight differences, just like the differences evident when different people tell the story of little red riding hood, but the similarities are startling.

The gospel writers did not just record the tradition, they arranged it to better convey truth. Each of our gospel writers is a theologian in his own right. Look, for example, at the way Matthew gathers together all of Jesus' teachings and assembles them in thematic blocks. Both Mark and Luke are very careful how they arrange the stories and sayings to better draw out the truth. This is why we are best to study the gospels in blocks rather than individual stories. By the way, I say "his", but just because the gospels come with a male title doesn't mean a woman didn't compose one or more of them.

Anyway, the point is that in the gospels we have the recorded observations of a group of men who were permanently with Jesus in the latter part of his ministry. They noted carefully what Jesus said and did, and here today we have before us their record; the Jesus story. Their gift to us enables us to be with Jesus, as they were with Jesus, to know him and to be one with him, as they knew him and were one with him.

1. Discuss what is known as the synoptic problem, ie., the problem in understanding why the first three gospel are both similar and dissimilar at the same time.

2. The twelve were given authority to preach the gospel in word and sign. Presumably that authority rests with the church today. How is your church fulfilling this commission?

3. Explain how our being with Jesus is made possibly by the twelve being with Jesus.