Mark 3:1-6
Today’s passage for my study was Mark 3:1-6. Several things:
1. Divine Sovereignty of Jesus. (Mark 3:1) God in the person of Jesus ordained the entire man’s life with the withered hand. From the ridicule as a child, to the learning to cope with day-to-day, mundane activities, he ORDAINED the man’s life for this very moment in time. This reminds me of the man born blind that He healed in John 8:1-9. The man’s life (and mine) is COMPLETELY in the hands of Jesus.
2. The blindness of religion. (Mark 3:2) How blind is religion? Completely. The hypocrisy is tangible in this verse….the waiting on the very edge of their chairs for Jesus to slip up….not to see a miracle – rather, to see if the laws of man would be honored by the Son of Man. Today, I MUST deny the man-centered nature within; I MUST deny myself and exalt the Christ. Otherwise, I’m nothing but religious. There will be no power, no affect, no life. Jesus is life, and Lord of all.
3. The readiness to heal. (Mark 3:3) Jesus stands ready to heal perfectly. He stands ready for my life to be made complete. Even in the sharing of sufferings in Christ, He is ready. He stands ready for my persecution. He is ready for my safety in the face of temptation. He stands ready as my Refuge and my Strength. He is the rock that never moves.
4. Jesus is confrontational. (Mark 3:4) Jesus never minced words. He is The Word. He brought to the blind religionists’ attention the very heart of the problem: Man vs. God. Man’s will vs. God’s will. Man’s bondage vs. God’s freedom. I need to be confrontational (in love) as well. Mainly confronting my own sin, my own apathy, my own man-centeredness.
5. Jesus gets mad. (Mark 3:5) The thing that ticks Him off is our man-centeredness. This can come in the form of personal convictions about “gray areas” that we then lay onto our brethren. John 8:36 says it succintly that we are free in Christ COMPLETELY.
6. Jesus heals completely. (Mark 3:5) There is no room for a ‘half healing’ or a ’slow getting better’. The man was frankly, completely healed. His hand was made perfect.
7. Religion seeks to destroy life. (Mark 3:6) This is true even now. I MUST RUN from any and all religion, and cling to the bloody cross of Christ Jesus. Religion is never a thing that saves – it is only God who saves; it is only God who heals completely, bringing life to a person dead in their sins.
Meditation: It is interesting comparing that day and time in the dusty synagogue in the Middle East 2 thousand years ago with today’s polished, entertaining, and me-centered bohemoth called church. Both have a man-centered view of God, both have a man-centered view of man. Even so, it is also interesting to know that in the blackness of my own heart, there remains old flesh-related desires to build up rules and regulations with which to live by, all under the auspices of ‘holiness’.
May God continue to open my eyes to the truth of God’s grace in Christ.
This entry was posted on Sunday, September 21st, 2008 at 5:38 pm and is filed under Devotional. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
