Mark

By Joyce Webb 2022\

Chapter 3 Verses 1-12

Verse 1 Jesus is in the Jewish church (synagogue). A man is there who has a withered hand. (Meaning the hand is crippled and can not be used)

The Jewish leaders watch Jesus to see what he will do. If he heals the man, they will say he is breaking Jewish law—by “working” on the Sabbath (holy church day of rest).

Jesus said to the man–”Come near.” Then Jesus said to the group of men, “ Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath?”
“To save life? Or to kill?

The Jewish leaders would not answer him.

Jesus looked at them. He was angry. He saw the hardness of their hearts. (Jesus knew that they thought it was more important to obey their made-up rule of what “work” was—–than it was to heal a person and make them well.)

Jesus did not touch the man. Jesus stood still. He just talked to the man. So far, Jesus is not “working”.

Jesus spoke to the man—“Stretch (reach out) your hand.” Jesus is not “doing” anything, except talking.

When the man reached out his hand—-it became well and normal.

Verse 6 When the Pharisees saw this they were angry. They left the church.
They met with some men who were called Herodians.
The Herodians were Jewish men who liked the Roman governor, Herod.

They often tried to get the Jewish leaders to accept more of the Roman way of doing things.

Usually, the Pharisees did not like those men and thought they were wrong to try to be more like the Romans.

But now, after this man is healed in the Jewish church—and Jesus did it in a way that he was not “working”—-they are so angry—they go to these Herodians to try to work with them to catch Jesus so they can arrest him.

Verse 7 Jesus and his disciples try to get away from the crowd—so they went to the sea. But the crowd followed them.

Verse 7-8 Names all the towns and places that people came from to see Jesus and see his miracles.

Verse 9 Jesus wanted to sit in a boat because of the many people crowding around him.

Verse 10 Jesus had healed many people. The people knew they, too, could be healed—so they pushed close to Jesus so he would touch them and they could be healed.

(We need to remember that Jesus is in a human body that gets tired.
All those people wanting to be healed used a lot of energy from Jesus. After a time, he got very tired and needed a rest. He usually did not get to rest, because the people keep coming and wanting him to heal them.)

Verse 11 People who had evil spirits in them—when they saw Jesus—they fell down before Jesus and the evil spirit in them made them cry out saying—”You are the Son of God.”

Verse 12 Jesus told the evil spirits to be quiet. He did not want them to “make known who he was”.

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(To us —this may seem strange. Why not let them tell who he was?

Evil spirits–demons—know who Jesus is. The Bible says—They believe and tremble.

Some Bible teachers say: Evil spirits know the truth—but that does not mean they will tell the truth.

You could not depend on an evil spirit to say the truth.

In this case, it was the truth, but to trust an evil spirit’s word about something would be foolish.

Other Bible teachers explain that:
Some of the Jewish leaders were saying that Jesus had a devil in him and that is why he could cast out devils.

Jesus told them that did not make sense. Why would a devil cast out another devil from a person?

Yet—since these leaders were saying this about Jesus—-Jesus did not want the evil spirits to be speaking —-even the truth.

People knew the evil spirits did bad things to the people they were in. Why trust what they said? Why trust an evil spirit’s word on anything. So, Jesus just told them to be quiet and not say anything.

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I, personally, do not know what to think about this.

It seems to me that the evil spirits when they faced Jesus—could not help themselves—but had to say the truth.

The Bible says that someday—-in heaven—-when every person has to stand before God and give an account of themselves—-that every person—will bow on their knee and every tongue will confess and say that Jesus is Lord. See Romans 14:11 and Philippians 2:9-11.

Someday—even those who say they do not believe in God—-will bow their knee and confess that God is God. The truth will be so overwhelming that they will just say it.

I think this is what happens to the evil spirits.

Yet, Jesus did not want them to speak. Jesus made them leave the person they were in—by a spoken word from Jesus—they had to go out of the person.

People saw this. They were amazed that Jesus had power over the evil spirits.

What a silly thing it was for the Jewish leaders to one day say that the reason Jesus could cast out evil spirits was because Jesus was the chief leader of the evil spirits.

Why would one evil spirit make another evil spirit go out of a person? That thinking does not make sense. And that is what Jesus told the Jewish leaders.

So, why Jesus told the evil spirits not to say who he was—-I am not really sure.

The people could see the miracles he did. They heard him teach.

People believed in Jesus because of these two things——and because when Jesus was teaching—he spoke with such power and authority. The Bible says this in many places. The people’s hearts were touched by the power of his words.

The Jewish leaders saw the miracles, too. They also heard him preach. But they would not believe that Jesus was God’s son.

They might have believed he was a clever teacher. And that he did miracles—-which they could not explain—but they thought he was just an ordinary man—who said he was God’s Son.

For all of us—-believing in Jesus—has to come from the heart and spirit.

The Holy Spirit speaks to our spirit—that the things about Jesus are true—and we believe.

Jesus often told the Pharisees about the “hardness” of their hearts and spirits. They had their minds made up about how things would be and they were not going to change their minds.)

They, too, heard the evil sprits say who Jesus was, they saw the miracles—-they felt the power of Jesus’ teaching—–yet, –they let none of that changed their minds.

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I want to say this about “miracles”. Satan has power to make things look like a “miracle”. He has knowledge of science more than any person. He can make things look like something else.

There are “healers” who move their hands over people and “pull out tumors and cancers” and say the person is healed. It is an “illusion”. It is made to look like something that it is not. And afterwards, the person seems to be well.

The Bible says that in the days of the Anti Christ—-He and the False Prophet will be able to do miracles. They will do them by the power of Satan.

So “miracles” are not always the sign that it is of God. You need to look closer.

Is the person really a follower of Jesus/God?
Is the person really obeying the teachings of the Bible?
Is this “miracle” really of the Holy Spirit?

If you look at the person’s life and what they believe and how they live—-you can usually tell if they are a true follower of Christ.

Do they do things of the occult—spirit worship,
do you see signs and symbols that have to do with witchcraft,
does the person do rituals of witchcraft,
does the person do sins that the Bible says is wrong
——then you need to think carefully about their “miracles”.
Their “miracles” may not be of God.

The Bible tells us to test the spirits to see if they are of God or not——
I John 4:1

This is very important. We are living in days where more and more we see people being interested in doing witchcraft.

In some countries, they see it all around and know about it. In the United States, witchcraft has been a small group. The last few years, more and more people are joining these beliefs.

Be careful ! Pray about it. Ask God to show you the truth about something.

Keep your heart/spirit in tune with the Holy Spirit—- so he can warn you and show you the truth.