Mark 1

Mark 1:1-3

The Gospel According to Mark I “The Beginning of the Gospel”- Mark 1:1 Mark 1:1-3. THE Gospel according to Mark is the briefest of the four. In all likelihood it was the earliest written. It was written probably before the death of Paul, but not later than the destruction of Jerusalem. Irenaeus definitely said that it was written after the deaths of Paul and Peter, but more recent investigation would place it earlier, that is before 63 A. D.

Patristic testimony agrees that it was influenced by Peter, that indeed it is the record of the facts concerning Jesus as they were told by Peter in his preaching, and recorded by his friend, Mark. This view is strengthened by modern scholarship.

Mark gives us practically no material other than that which is recorded by Matthew. The difference between the Gospels is that of method, rather than that of matter. The method of Mark is characterized, by directness and brevity (almost amounting to bluntness), accompanied by certain circumstantial touches which give us a most vivid sense of the Lord, in many details of look, gesture, and habits of speech.

The history of the writer of this Gospel as it may be traced in the New Testament, is a most interesting one. His Jewish name was John, Mark being his Latin surname. His mother, as Luke informs us in the book of Act 12:12, was a woman of wealth, living in Jerusalem, evidently a personal friend of Peter, and hostess of the Christian disciples in the early days after Pentecost. By a reference, in the first letter of Peter, we may surmise that Mark was spiritually a son of Peter (1 Peter 5:13), that he was brought to a knowledge of the Lord Christ savingly under the ministry of the ‘great apostle. He was also a cousin of Barnabas. The first appearance of Mark in New Testament history is found in the story of the journey of Paul and Barnabas from Jerusalem to.

Antioch, upon which journey he accompanied them. He then went with them on the first missionary journey, suddenly leaving them at Perga. Why he left them, we do not know. It is an interesting fact that almost all expositors assume that he was afraid of the campaign, and went home, but there is no shadow of evidence that fear was the reason for his return. Certainly later on, discussion and separation occurred between Paul and Barnabas upon this very subject, for when starting upon another journey, Barnabas desired to take Mark with him, and Paul objected, because Mark had “gone back.” That may be the reason why it is supposed that Mark turned back from fear. But, though Paul refused to take him, Barnabas desired to do so; and it is quite as possible that Barnabas was right, as Paul.

So we may give Mark the benefit of the doubt. It is certain that he went with Barnabas to Cyprus, and subsequently was with Paul in Rome, a “fellow labourer,” and a comfort. From a reference in Peter’s first letter we gather that he accompanied that apostle to Babylon ; and the last glimpse of him is that in Paul’s last letter to Timothy, wherein he charged him to bring Mark with him again to Rome.

The general consensus of opinion leads to the conclusion that the narrative was written by Mark in Rome, and was intended primarily for Gentiles. It is interesting to remember that there are no references to the Jewish law in this Gospel; that there are only two quotations from the ancient Scriptures, one of which is in this brief introduction; and that he constantly explains peculiarly Jewish terms and customs, which it would not be at all necessary to do to Jewish people. That however is a purely incidental matter, and in no way affects the presentation of the Lord which the narrative makes.

Bernard in his Bampton Lectures in 1864 entitled “ The Progress of Doctrine in the New Testament,” than which a more valuable series of Lectures was never delivered upon that great subject, said of this Gospel something which so perfectly describes it, that I will quote the paragraph:

“It is the Gospel of action, rapid, vigorous, vivid. Entering at once on the Lord’s official and public career, it bears us on from one mighty deed to another with a peculiar swiftness of movement, and yet with the life of picturesque detail. Power over the visible and invisible worlds, especially as shown in the casting out of devils, is the prominent characteristic of the picture. St. Peter’s saying to Cornelius has been well noticed as a fit motto for this Gospel. ‘ God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power, who went about doing good and healing all those who were oppressed of the devil,’ " Thus while Matthew presents us with the picture of the Messiah as King in ‘all the royalty of His Person, the dignity of His office, and the grace of His mission; Mark gives us the picture of the Messiah as Servant, divested of all official dignity, save that of consecration to His work.

Our first meditation is concerned with the brief paragraph contained in the first three verses of chapter one.

With regard to the study of this Gospel I propose a perfectly free method; that is, I shall break through the trammels of chapters, verses, paragraphs, and punctuations as found in our versions.

This paragraph is the key to the whole Gospel, and therefore we must pause with it. It is complete within itself. The narrative proper of Mark begins with the fourth verse, with the words, “John came.” The story begins with the appearing of John. I should say after careful reading, that probably the last thing Mark wrote was the opening paragraph. After he had finished his story, that vivid wonderful story in which we become almost breathless sometimes as we follow our Lord on the swiftness of the path of His earthly mission, Mark went back to write a title or preface, and in this preface we find the key of all that is to follow:

“The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God, even as it is written in Isaiah the prophet. Behold, I send My messenger before Thy face Who shall prepare Thy way. The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make ye ready the way of the Lord, Make His paths straight.” Mark first declared that he had written a “beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God as it is written in Isaiah the prophet.” He then immediately wrote an exclamatory quotation, not from Isaiah, but from the last of the Hebrew prophets, Malachi.

“Behold, I send My messenger before Thy face who shall prepare Thy way.” Having done so, he quoted from the prophecy of Isaiah at the point in the prophecy where the Gospel began: “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make ye ready the way of the Lord, Make His paths straight.”

Let us turn back to Malachi, m order to see the setting of the exclamatory quotation: “Behold, I send My messenger, and he shall prepare the way before Me.” In the prophecy the words run on thus: “And the Lord, Whom ye seek, will suddenly come to His temple; and the messenger of the covenant, whom ye desire behold, he cometh, saith Jehovah of Hosts.” In this prophetic word reference was made to two messengers, the Messenger of the covenant, and the messenger who precedes the Messenger of the covenant. Mark only quotes the words concerning the messenger who was to foretell the coming of the Messenger of the covenant.

He then went back to his starting point: “the Gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God, even as it is written in Isaiah,” and quoted from the prologue of the second part of Isaiah:

“The voice of one that crieth, Prepare ye in the wilderness the way of Jehovah, make level in the desert a highway for our God. . . . O thou that tellest the Gospel, good tidings to Zion . . . O thou that tellest good tidings to Jerusalem” (Isaiah 40:3 and Isaiah 40:9). To read Isaiah from the fortieth chapter to the end of the prophecy is to discover the Servant of God; it is an unveiling of the suffering Servant of God; while yet the same Servant of God is seen ultimately in triumph, a triumph won out of travail. This book then gives an account of the beginning of that Gospel, which according to Mark, was written in Isaiah.

We have said that Peter was in all probability the source from whom Mark derived his information. In his first letter (1 Peter 1:24-25), he quoted from Isaiah, and from the same passage:

“All flesh is as grass, And all the glory thereof as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower falleth: But the word of the Lord abideth forever.” He then went on to say, “And this is the word of the Gospel which was preached unto you.”

Here then, we are admitted to the spirit of this Gospel of Mark. It is the Beginning, the starting point of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, as it is written in the prophet Isaiah. The paragraph is an inclusive introduction to all that is to follow. The word “Beginning” refers, not to the paragraph, not to the ministry of John, not to the ministry of Jesus. It refers to the Gospel. In this book we have the story of the beginning of the whole Gospel.

Here Mark has written the story of how the Gospel which Isaiah predicted became historic. Light is flung upon this matter, by the way in which Luke commenced his second treatise. “The former treatise I made, O Theophilus, concerning all that Jesus began both to do and to teach.” That former treatise was also the story of a beginning; so that the Gospel according to Luke is also the account of the beginning of the Gospel.

The reference to Isaiah admits us to the spirit of all that is to follow, and so constitutes the key to its spiritual interpretation. What Isaiah predicted, Jesus fulfilled. Isaiah foresaw that the way of comfort was the way of the coming of Jehovah in His suffering and victorious Servant, to deal with sin and bring in righteousness. Here then is the story of how that Gospel became a fact in human history.

It is sufficient therefore now for us to notice, as the completion of this initial study; first, the supreme subject referred to; and secondly, the special theme of the book.

The supreme subject is “the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” What does the word “Gospel” mean? In many senses there can be no better translation of the Greek word than that of which we constantly make use, the Evangel. What is an evangel? Dr. Maclear says that in classical Greek the word first meant a reward given to the bearers of good news; that it subsequently came to mean the sacrifice offered in thankfulness for good news; until finally it was used of the good news itself.

This last is the invariable New Testament sense. The Gospel is in itself a message of salvation, a message of comfort, a message of hope, a message of joy; a message that should always thrill to the tireless music of a psalm, a message that has nothing to do with denunciation. The Gospel is not preached when sin is denounced. The Gospel is good news to sinning men z a message of salvation from sin.

The word does not occur very often in the Gospel itself, but the occurrences illuminate the theme. After this opening paragraph it is almost immediately found twice. Mark tells us that when Jesus began His preaching in Galilee, He began to preach “the Gospel of God,” the good news from God. Mark alone tells us that when Jesus began to preach, He not only said, “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand”; but that He also said, “and believe in the Gospel.” The word is not found again until after Peter’s confession at Caesarea Philippi, when Mark alone tells us that Jesus called His disciples to deny themselves and take up the Cross for His sake, and for the sake of the Gospel. Soon after, in those shadowed days while He was instructing these men, approaching the Cross, He used that same phrase a second time, “for My sake and the Gospel’s” There is one beautiful incidental use of .it, when the disciples, misunderstanding the prodigality of the love of the woman who anointed Jesus with ointment, He said, “Wheresoever the Gospel shall be preached . . . that also which this woman hath done shall be spoken of for a memorial of her.” Only once more it occurs, in the final chapter, as He appointed His disciples, to “go . . . and preach the Gospel to all the cosmos.” There is always music in the word, hope in it, comfort in it, gladness in it; it is a veritable song to cheer the heart, and renew the courage; the Gospel, good news.

In this opening word, “the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God,” everything is gathered up. By these words we are at once reminded, as we commence to study this book that the centre and circumference of the Gospel is Christ Himself; for whatever may be the harmonies of the varied notes of the infinite music, they are all homed and centered in Him. Not carelessly does this writer name Him at the commencement by the Old Testament word, Jesus. That is the name that places Him upon the level of my comprehension; for in the Man Who bore the name we find the point of contact between ourselves, and the One Whom He supremely came to reveal. Take Him away from me, and remind me merely of the administrative power of God in His universe, and I am lost, for I cannot grasp the unfathomable truth. Take Him away from me, and speak to my soul of God in all the wonder and mystery of His being, and He is utterly incomprehensible to me.

A gospel that is a Gospel of God, but is not spelt out into my language and rendered observable by my finite nature, becomes no Gospel to me. Mark commences where God began to fulfill the prophecy of His servants. The charm of this Gospel is that through it we shall be following Jesus, walking with Him, watching His gestures, listening to the very habits of His speech.

In the title “Christ,” Mark suggests the way by which God administers that salvation, the proclamation of which is good news. Christ is the Messiah, the anointed One. The name Jesus brings us into the presence of the Galilean peasant. But Messiah, the anointed One, brings us into the presence of One upon Whom the holy chrism rests, the chrism of the Holy Spirit; enduing Him for service; and empowering Him for dying, for it was through the eternal Spirit that He offered Himself.

The ultimate phrase of the great description, “Son of God,” suggests the infinitude of His power, reminding us that whereas men lay the hand of flesh imaginatively upon the hand of His flesh, they will yet be conscious of the thrilling power of essential Deity when His hand closes upon theirs; reminding us that men may look into human eyes, capable of human tears, the gleams of human laughter, and the tragedy of human sorrow; and yet see shining through them the light of essential Deity. Jesus, the anointed One, Son of God. It is the Gospel of One, sent, anointed of the Spirit, of the very nature of the Father. What He says is the Gospel. What He does is the Gospel.

Recently I came across some striking words from the pen of Mazzini:

“He came. The soul the most full of love, the most sacredly virtuous, the most deeply inspired by God and the future that men have yet seen on earth-Jesus. He bent over the corpse of the dead world, and whispered a word of faith. Over the clay that had lost all of man, but the movement and the form, He uttered words until then unknown: Love, Sacrifice, a heavenly origin. And the dead arose, a new life circulated through the clay, which philosophy had tried in vain to reanimate. From that corpse arose the Christian world, the world of liberty and equality. From that clay arose the true Man, the image of God, the precursor of humanity.” The Gospel is the good news of Jesus, the Anointed, Son of God. Alas that men sometimes proclaim it, as though there were no music in it! It is the music of all music; the inspiration of all music that is worthy the name: The Gospel!

That emphasizes the special theme of the book. We shall not look for, neither shall we find, the philosophy of the Gospel. We shall not discover here the explanation of the Divine operation by which the Gospel became possible. The full content of the Gospel, and its final application, are not here, save by implication. This is the beginning. Isaiah predicted the Gospel, and there was no prophecy of the ancient time with which these Hebrews were more familiar than his.

Paul proclaimed it, and probably Mark knew that. It is almost certain that this book was written in Rome. Then think of this fact that Paul sent to Rome a letter, constituting the philosophy and explanation of the Gospel. Therein he wrote, “I am not ashamed of the Gospel; for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth … for therein is revealed a righteousness of God from faith unto faith.” He then went on to explain the Gospel; and the probability is that Mark had read that letter before he wrote this Gospel. He came to Rome, was there with Paul; and Paul’s letter was there before Paul ever reached Rome. So that when Mark had written out Peter’s story, he prefaced it with a statement of how the Gospel began, which Isaiah predicted, of which Peter told the story, and which Paul explained in his book.

This is how the prediction was fulfilled in history, how the Gospel came to be.

Our purpose in studying this Gospel is to watch the Servant of Jehovah, Jesus Christ the Son of God; to watch Him, rather than the people about Him; to observe Him as He is revealed here in the workings of His mind, and His attitude toward those who came into contact with Him.

Matthew wrote of the King, and of His method for establishing the Kingdom. Luke wrote of the perfect Man, and the universality of His Saviourhood. John wrote of the hidden mystery of His Being. Or again Matthew wrote of the Christ, Luke of Jesus, John of the Son of God. Mark here portrays that One Who is at once Jesus and Messiah and Son of God, as the Servant of God creating the Gospel. As we consider Him we shall know the Gospel.

Mark 1:4-13

II “Jesus came.”- Mark 1:9. Mark 1:4-13. THESE are the central words of this first paragraph of the Gospel of Mark. The subject of the book, as we have seen, is that of how “the Gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God” began. The story is developed along the lines suggested by that opening description of the Servant of Jehovah. He is referred to as Jesus consistently, through all the first stages to the confession of Peter at Caesarea Philippi, and never as Christ. At Caesarea Philippi He was confessed to be the Christ by Peter, and subsequently that title recurs five times. Jesus used it of Himself (Mark 9:41); He used it of the predicted Messiah when speaking of His relationship to David (Mark 12:35); He used it when warning His disciples against the coming of false Christs (Mark 13:21); the high priest used it when challenging Him as to who He was (Mark 14:61); and finally the high priests used it when they mocked Him in the hour of His dying (Mark 15:32).

The designation, Son of God, was twice made use of before Caesarea Philippi, on each occasion by an evil spirit. Apart from these instances it is never found until the high priest challenged Him in the words, “Art Thou the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?” and He replied, “I am.” It is found finally in the story of the crucifixion, when the centurion after the death of Jesus said, “Truly this man was the Son of God.”

We shall best apprehend the early part of the story as we look at Him as He is presented by the name Jesus, divesting ourselves of many of those attitudes of mind which are necessary as we know Him fully as the Christ, and as the Son of God. In order that we may come to a more perfect apprehension of the meaning of that title, of that sacred and mystic designation, we shall attempt to see Him first as these men saw Him, as Jesus of Nazareth.

In this paragraph we have the story of the beginning of the Beginning of the Gospel. In a few sentences, full of life and colour, Mark gives an account of the ministry of John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Messiah, whose coming had been foretold by Malachi, and whose mission had been described by Isaiah. Then, with brevity and haste, but most graphically, he records the stages through which Jesus of Nazareth, the Servant of Jehovah passed to the actual service to which He was appointed.

In a phrase, “From Nazareth of Galilee,” he refers to the past; and then records the facts of His baptism, His anointing, and His temptation. This is how “the beginning of the Gospel” began. Jesus came from Nazareth to baptism, anointing, and temptation. These facts had a bearing on His service, and therefore are recorded. Let us consider them in that order, and in that relation.

Jesus came “from Nazareth of Galilee,” where He had been the Self-emptied One for a generation, one of the people; undistinguishable from other men by the eyes of those who looked upon Him; undiscovered as to any deep secret of personality, or any profound anointing for service. He had borne one of the most commonplace names of the day, Jesus, which is the Greek form of Joshua. The probability is that there were many named Joshua in Nazareth and Jerusalem, and throughout that district. Nobody distinguished Him from others by the name; no halo was round His brow; there was nothing strange about Him; He was one of the crowd, a man among men.

He came from Nazareth, of which place so devout and sincere and simple a soul as Nathaniel said, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” He came from Galilee, referred to always with contempt by the Judaeans, “Galilee o the Gentiles!”

Nazareth to Jesus had been the place of growth from boyhood to manhood; the place where He had grown in wisdom as well as in stature; the place where He had grown in grace with God and with men. Nazareth had been to Him moreover the place of ordinary human experiences, where He had faced ordinary human responsibilities in fellowship with God; a fellowship strange and mystic, different from that experienced by other men, but a fellowship which was the birthright of all men. There in Nazareth He had wrought through the working days; and on the recurring Sabbaths, “as His custom was “He had mingled with the worshippers, reading the law, and hearing it expounded, being brought up in the atmosphere of the conscious nearness of Jehovah, the God of His fathers. There, He had passed through busy days, a carpenter, learning the use of tools until He mastered them, making yokes and ploughs, and building houses. He was an ordinary workman, bearing ordinary human responsibilities, and entering into ordinary human experiences.

But Nazareth had been more than all this to Him. It had been the place of quietness, the place of seclusion, the place of meditation. In the statement that He grew in grace with men is revealed the fact that He was undisturbed by hostilities and criticisms. There in the quietness of the years, from boyhood’s age of twelve to manhood’s age of thirty, He had the opportunity of the thinking that comes to every man who has the high privilege of spending early years in a quiet country town, out of the way of the rush of cities.

From all this “Jesus came”; and He came “in those days,” when in Judaea there were strange, religious awakenings under the ministry of John; when that proud, self-centered countryside around Jerusalem was moved to its heart as it had not been for long, by that wonderful ministry; when men were pouring out, to listen to the strange ascetic preacher who lashed them with whips, and ploughed up their conscience, and called them to repentance; and when they, repenting, went out from Judaea and Jerusalem to his baptism, confessing their sins. In that hour of spiritual and religious revival the young Carpenter turned His back upon Nazareth and came. So the day of the Gospel dawned.

He came to baptism, anointing, and temptation. In our study of this Gospel we may deal with these stories with the brevity that characterizes the narrative itself.

He came to baptism. In order to understand the meaning of His coming to baptism, the ordinary facts concerning the ministry of John must be remembered. John had been preaching repentance unto remission of sins, not repentance for remission of sins. There could be no remission of sins apart from the ministry of Jesus. It was repentance unto remission of sins. John had exercised a ministry that produced repentance, in order to prepare for a ministry that should issue in remission.

That is the reason why Mark is more particular than Matthew at this point to record one aspect of the burden of the preaching of John. He himself declared, “There cometh after me He that is mightier than I, the latchet of Whose shoes I am not worthy to stoop down and unloose.” Then he defined his own declaration. “I baptized you with water”-which is the symbol of washing, and. accompanies repentance-“but He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit”-which is not a symbol, but a strength, renewing and regenerating the life, through which remission of sins shall come, and the beginning of a new life with new possibilities. John’s ministry was to produce repentance unto remission; and to declare the coming of the One Who should accomplish all that was made necessary by repentance. To that ministry Jesus now came.

He “was baptized.” Here we are face to face with a most amazing fact. If John’s baptism was for repentance, and was the outward sign of repenting souls, how are we to understand this baptizing of Jesus? Matthew tells us that when John saw Him coming, he looked at Him and said, “I have need to be baptized of Thee, and comest Thou to me?” It is of supreme importance that we understand that when John said that, he did not know Who Jesus was, he did not know that He was the Messiah. John himself distinctly declared that he did not know the Messiah until he saw the Holy Spirit descending upon Him. John looked into those eyes;-John, than whom a greater never had been born of women as Jesus said, who in many respects was the greatest of the long line of Hebrew prophets; John, the man of clear moral perception, who had been looking fearlessly, as prophets ever do, into the eyes of the crowds that gathered about him; John looked into the eyes of this One Who came to be baptized, and said: No, this is a baptism of repentance! I am here to baptize men repenting of sins!

I need to be baptized of Thee! Comest Thou to me? This was a prophetic recognition and declaration of the sinlessness of Jesus.

Then why was He baptized? He was baptized as a repenting soul. His also, was a baptism of repentance. His also was a baptism of the confession of sins. In that hour He repented, He confessed sins. But the repentance was not for Himself, the sins were not His own. In that hour He identified Himself with the multitudes who had been thronging out to baptism, identified Himself with them in the consciousness of sin, in repentance for it, in confession of it. In that hour of baptism we see the most solemn and wonderful sight of the Servant of God, Who had come from the silence and seclusion of Nazareth, taking upon Himself the burden of human sin, counting it as if it were His own sin, doing that to which an apostolic writer ultimately referred by declaring, “He was made sin.”

So “Jesus came,” in the hour of widespread concern and change of mind, to identify Himself with sinners that they might be identified with Him, thus, as Matthew tells us that He Himself said, “to fulfill all righteousness.” Righteousness is never fulfilled by repentance. Repentance will lead toward it, repentance is the condition for it; but repentance alone can never produce righteousness. He repented, and confessed sins, as symbolizing the fact that He, the Sinless, was identifying Himself with the sinful, in order that,-in an infinite mystery, for ever beyond our understanding,-in that identification, through infinite love and compassion, righteousness should become possible to the sinners whose sins He bore, and whose sorrows He endured. Thus He came to a baptism that indicated the method of His service as that of an identifying of Himself with sinning men; of being numbered with the transgressors, that He might bear the sins of many, as Isaiah had said, when speaking of this Servant of God.

What immediately followed? “Straightway coming up out of the water, He saw the heavens rent asunder, and the Spirit as a dove descending upon Him: and a voice came out of the heavens, Thou art My beloved Son, in Thee I am well pleased.” The word “straightway” marks the immediateness of heaven’s response to all that was suggested by His baptism. Luke alone declares that when thus the heavens were opened, and the Spirit descended, Jesus was praying. He descended to the waters of baptism, was immersed beneath them, emerged from them, came to the banks, and prayed. Then, “straightway,” in that hour, He was endued for that service to which He had now dedicated Himself. His baptism was His act of dedication, the coming of the Spirit was God’s act of consecration. Not that here and now Jesus of Nazareth received the Spirit of God for the first time.

His whole being was attended by the operation of the Spirit. His very human life was due to the mystic and mighty operation of the Spirit, and all the years in Nazareth were years in which He had been filled with the Spirit. Yet this was something new, something separate, something remarkably beautiful for Him and for us, to the end of time. An enduement of the Spirit was given to Him as the Servant of God in a new sense, in a new significance, and with new powers.

This is the only occasion in the whole Bible where the Spirit is referred to as taking this particular form of manifestation. He came as a dove; and so as the symbol of the infinite gentleness and harmlessness of Jesus of Nazareth. There came an hour when in the teaching of Jesus He said to His disciples that they were to be “wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.” Here the harmlessness of Jesus was suggested, and that quality of harmlessness as necessary, if the work to which He had dedicated Himself was to be accomplished.

Yet to Him, a Hebrew after the flesh, this symbolic form had more in it than the suggestiveness of harmlessness. It was in itself a suggestion of sacrifice on the lowest level; on the lowest level that is, not as to intrinsic value, but as to the capacity of a worshipper. The poorest, who could bring nothing else, were permitted to’ bring a dove as their offering for sin. Now, in an infinite beauty harmonizing with the Self-emptying of the Son of God, the Spirit of God took this form of the dove, the symbol of harmlessness and of sacrifice brought to the level of the poorest. In that hour of anointing there came to Him enablement for the service to which He had formally dedicated Himself, thus fulfilling the word of Isaiah, “Behold My Servant, whom I uphold; My Chosen, in whom My soul delighteth; I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the Gentiles. He will not cry, nor lift up His voice, nor cause it to be heard in the street.”

There came to Him also the Father’s ratification, the voice that sounded in His own soul, whether others heard it or not we have no means of knowing. To translate it literally, this is what the voice said: “Thou art the Son of Me; the Beloved. In Thee I. am well pleased.” By the symbol of His baptism He had manifested His dedication to all the mystery of His suffering and death. Then, said the Voice, “Thou art the Son of Me, My Beloved.” There came a day later on in His ministry, when He said, “Therefore doth the Father love Me, because I lay down My life.” In that hour of dedication, He had testimony borne to Him by His Father, of the Divine approval of that act of dedication by which He presently would fulfill righteousness in men through and beyond repentance, by giving them remission z regeneration, and renewal.

Again, the Voice said, “In Thee I am well pleased.” The words, “My Chosen, in whom My soul delighteth” had been written by Isaiah long before; and Mark declared, This is the story of the beginning of the Gospel of which Isaiah wrote; this is how it came to be.

Here then we see Him, setting His face toward His mission, receiving the enduement enabling Him to fulfill it, and the ratification within His soul of the fact that He was cooperating with God. So He came, not only to identification with sinners, but to all the resources of God, in order that He might accomplish His mission.

Finally He came to temptation. Here again, with that illuminative suggestiveness that characterizes Mark, he used words that arrest us: “And straightway the Spirit driveth Him forth into the wilderness.” Both Matthew and Luke indicate the fact that He went into the wilderness under the guidance of the Spirit, but Mark has used a strange word. “The Spirit driveth Him forth”; quite literally, “the Spirit casteth Him forth.” It is the very word afterward employed of the casting out of demons by Christ.

We shall come nearer to the spiritual value if we see the physical fact, and get nearer to the profound intention of the writer as we look at the humanness of the story. As we read that “the Spirit driveth Him forth,” casteth Him out, there comes before the vision a graphic picture of Jesus of Nazareth hastening, hurrying to the wilderness. No leisured, meditative walk this, but swift, impetuous movement, as of one driven irresistibly forth, so that there could be no halting. The resolve of His soul was revealed in His baptism. The resources at His disposal for the fulfilling of His resolve had been revealed in His anointing. Now He hastened to face the foe; not with a spirit buoyant perchance, but with a spirit filled with foreboding, for this was real temptation, actual temptation. The Spirit after His anointing drove Him to face the forces that ruin and blight and blast and spoil humanity.

Mark here records that which is most remarkable; not that He was in the wilderness for forty days and afterward was tempted, but that He was “forty days tempted of Satan.” We have here no account of the specific temptations, but we are not wronging the Gospel story if We assume that the temptations of the forty days were along the lines revealed by Matthew and Luke as they record the story of the final temptations, for in those stories we have an exhaustive picture of every avenue along which evil can approach Man soul. Temptation today seems very varied, but it may always be classified under one of these headings.

When He began to preach He said, “The Kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe in the Gospel.” The Kingdom of God is at hand. In that declaration was revealed the master passion of His Service. Why did He descend to the waters of baptism? To fulfill righteousness. Righteousness is the establishment of Divine Kingship, the setting up of the Kingdom of God. In order to do that it was necessary that He should deal with existing conditions of location, necessity, and failure.

It must be a Kingdom of bread, dealing with man’s material necessities; but it must go infinitely beneath that, it must be a Kingdom of fellowship with God, dealing with man’s spiritual nature. It must also be a Kingdom of beauty and of glory, which, in its ultimate establishment, shall realize all the highest things of beauty in the Being of God.

Jesus had come to establish that Kingdom, and for forty days He was tempted; tempted by His hunger to wonder whether God cared; tempted in the presence of the tremendous work that had opened out before Him, as to how far He might venture outside the Divine direction, how far He might proceed upon His own initiative; tempted as to whether the Kingdoms of the world, with all their glory and beauty, might not be gained apart from the method symbolized by His baptism.

The one inspiration of such service as that to which He had dedicated Himself, must be threefold; the inspiration of love, of faith, and of hope. For forty days He was tempted to doubt the love, to traffic with the faith, to question the hope; and at the end of forty days these things became most devilish, most concrete, and most terrific. It was real temptation! I know the old controversy of the theologians and the scholars as to the peccability of Christ. But unless He was tempted, then He was not tempted; unless He felt the lure of the suggestions made, there was no temptation! This lasted for forty days; it was continuous, insistent!

How did it all end? The statement of Mark is wonderfully graphic. He does not say anything about the victories as does Matthew or Luke; but simply says, “And He was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered unto Him.” Many expositors say that the sentence, “He was with the wild beasts” is intended to suggest the terribleness of the situation. I do not so read it. The Greek preposition marks the closest association and unity. “He was with the wild beasts”; but they were not wild with Him! He was God’s archetypal Man, realizing the first Divine intention of a perfect and beneficent mastery over the lower creation.

The beasts that were wild with other men gathered about Him in the wilderness and knew their Master, not as God, but as man in the perfection and sinlessness of His nature. “He was with the wild beasts.” I never go to the Zoological Gardens without wishing I could play with the lions! In the Kingdom that is to be, the lion shall lie down with the lamb, and a little child shall lead them. Then all their ferocity will have vanished. “He was with the wild beasts.” Morally victorious, He was Master of the creation beneath Him, and angels ran upon His errands, for such is the real suggestiveness of the word. Thus He is seen as God’s Man, perfect in spite of temptation!

So “Jesus came from Nazareth,” where for thirty years He had lived the self-emptied life; where for thirty years He had been without the prerogatives of sovereignty which were His in the inherent mystery of His being; where for thirty years He had been subject to parents and to human conditions. He came to men, and found them sinning, and joining them, repented with them and was baptized. He came to God, and had the answer of the anointing of His. Spirit, and the ratification of His high purpose. He came to Satan, and entered into conflict with him, and mastered him.

How can I better end than by quoting again the words of Isaiah? “Behold My Servant, whom I uphold; My Chosen, in whom My soul delighteth; I have put My Spirit upon Him.” So spake Jehovah of Him centuries before He came. Thus spake Jehovah of Him in the hour of His coming. “Thou art the Son of Me, My Beloved; in Thee I am well pleased.”

Mark 1:14-35

III “Jesus came into Galilee.”- Mark 1:14. Mark 1:14-35. LIKE Matthew and Luke, Mark commenced the record of the ministry of Jesus, at the point where He left Judaea-John being imprisoned-and in Galilee began a more public and positive propaganda.

Between the thirteenth and fourteenth verses in the first chapter of this Gospel we must allow for the passing of a year, during which our Lord wrought His first signs, and uttered His first teaching, travelling between Judaea and Galilee. The signs were wrought in Galilee and in Jerusalem, but the teaching was chiefly given in Judaea during that period. This year Dr. Stalker has fittingly described as “the year of obscurity.” The record of it is found only in John.

The first two verses of this paragraph (Mark 1:14-15) constitute an introduction to the whole period from the arrival in Galilee to the hour of the confession of Peter at Caesarea Philippi; an introduction to that period of the ministry which Mark records in the first eight chapters of the Gospel; a period in which our Lord probably never went to Jerusalem, but remained itinerating in Galilee, making Capernaum the base of His operations. The rest of the paragraph (verses 16-35) [Mark 1:16-35] gives some incidents of the first days of His public ministry.

Let us then survey the paragraph, and observe the Lord at His work.

The first matter which arrests attention is the time at which Jesus left Judaea for Galilee. It was the hour in which John was “delivered up.” The great herald of Jesus had fulfilled his ministry In a certain sense a year before this time, in pointing to Jesus as the coming One, the latchet of Whose shoes he did not count himself worthy to stoop down and unloose. But he had evidently continued his; work of proclaiming the nearness of the Kingdom, and of calling upon men to repent. There came an hour when he was arrested by Herod. His voice therefore was silenced; his public ministry was entirely at an end. At that hour, Jesus moved from Judaea into Galilee, into the district of Herod; not escaping from danger, but moving into the danger zone; not withdrawing Himself from peril because John was arrested, but going into the very region over which the man who had arrested John was reigning. Men may silence the voice of a prophet; but they cannot hinder the Word of God.

The next matter of importance is the declaration that He went into Galilee “preaching the Gospel of God.” Observe the change in the Revised Version; not “the Gospel of the Kingdom of God,” but “the Gospel of God.” This is what we describe as the genitive of the author; “the Gospel of God,” the Gospel that came from God, the glad tidings which God had sent to men. That was His message in Galilee. That indeed was the burden of His message throughout the whole of His life; not accusation, nor denunciation, but a proclamation of good news. “Think not that I will accuse you,” He said upon one occasion. “There is one that accuseth you, even Moses.” “God sent not the Son into the world to judge the world,” He said upon another occasion, “but that the world should be saved through Him.” He came preaching the good news. It is perfectly true that there were times when He accused men; but follow the method of our Lord, and observe that almost invariably when it was necessary for Him to accuse, He did so by such parabolic teaching, as compelled those who heard to accuse themselves in His presence, to find against themselves a verdict, and to pronounce a sentence. His mission was not that of accusation, nor of denunciation. His mission was that of the proclamation of the good news of God.

Then Mark proceeded to give the content of the Gospel, and the terms of Christ’s appeal. “The time is fulfilled, and the Kingdom of God is at hand.” That, in brief, is the whole content of the Gospel of God which Jesus came to proclaim. The time is fulfilled; the preparation is complete; the last thing that must necessarily be done before the Gospel can be preached is done. The Kingdom is at hand, brought to men, made nigh, made possible.

Upon the basis of that Gospel He made His constant appeal, which was twofold. First, “Repent ye,” literally, think again, change your mind! Deal with the inspirational centers of life, by changing the conceptions. Think over again. There is no suggestion of sorrow in this word. I admit that no man will repent in the way suggested by this word without feeling sorrow sooner or later. There is another word for repentance that does include sorrow, but that was not the word Jesus used here. It was not the word used by John. This word was one that called men to think again, to change their conceptions, out of which all conduct proceeds, which conduct issues in character. Repent! Think again!

Repentance was the message necessary to the establishment of the Kingdom; but there was more in the Gospel, and the final appeal was not to “repent,” but to “believe in the Gospel.” Not to “believe the Gospel.” There are many people who believe the Gospel, but they do not believe in it. It was an appeal not only to accept it as an intellectually accurate statement; but to rest in it, to repose in it. It was a call to let the heart find ease in it.

That was the key-note of His preaching throughout;-good news; the Kingdom of God is at hand; it is made available to men; and the appeal consequent upon good news was ever, repent, think back toward that Kingdom, readjust life by setting it in true relationship with that Kingdom; and then rest in this. Gospel, that what men thus choose to become, is made possible to them.

That introductory passage strikes the key-note of all the music that is to follow in the teaching of Jesus; it focusses all the glory of the light that is to flash upon the pathway, and flame through every activity of this anointed Servant of God, in the days of His flesh.

Before surveying the incidents that are recorded in the following paragraph, it is well to remember that an incident here occurred on the way to Capernaum which only Luke records. Jesus went to Nazareth, and into the synagogue with which He had been familiar from boyhood. There, taking up the roll of the prophet Isaiah, He read those remarkable Messianic words, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He anointed Me.” In the synagogue of His boyhood, among the people most familiar with Him in the flesh, He spoke words of such grace that they were filled with wonder; and yet they attempted to murder Him. Leading Him to the brow of the hill, they endeavoured to cast Him down headlong. He moved away from them in mystic, strange, startling power, and escaped.

On His way into the city of Capernaum, passing by the seashore, the place of the boats of the fisher-folk, He called four men to Himself; Simon and Andrew, James and John. They knew Him; they had met Him at least a year before, and for some weeks, if not months, had travelled with Him; until at Samaria He had dismissed, them to their own folk, and had gone back alone to Jerusalem. Now He called them, and said this significant thing to them: “Come ye after Me, and I will make you to become fishers of men.” Thus He came to Capernaum.

Then Mark recorded, in his own characteristic style, the story of the first Sabbath at Capernaum (Mark 1:21-35). It is an account of what Jesus did in the morning, in the afternoon, and in the evening. In the morning He was in the synagogue; in the afternoon He was at home; in the evening He was in the streets outside His home.

In the morning He went to the synagogue. One can imagine that synagogue service in Capernaum, with its liturgy, its reading of the Benedictions, its chantings of hallelujahs; the reading of the portion of the Thorah or Law appointed for the day; and then the reading of the portion of the prophets appointed for the day. Finally Jesus taught. There is no record of what He said, but we have heard the key-note. He was preaching the Gospel. Speaking of the Kingdom of God, He told them that it was nigh, at hand; and appealed to them to believe in that Gospel.

That service was suddenly disturbed by a man possessed of an unclean spirit crying out: “What is there to us and to Thee?” “Art Thou come to destroy us?” “I know Thee who Thou art, the Holy One of God.” Jesus turned, and said to him, quite literally, “Be muzzled, and come out of him”; and at once the evil spirit came out. The crowds were amazed, and said, “What is this? a new teaching!” His teaching was thus emphasized by His power. So passed the morning, in teaching and healing.

The afternoon was passed at Simon’s house; whither He went with Simon and Andrew, James and John. Immediately on arrival they told Him of Simon’s wife’s mother who was in the grip of a fever. Jesus, went to her, and raised her up, and the fever left her. Those who have had a sick one in the home can imagine that afternoon, when the woman who had been in the grip of a burning fever and all had been troubled about her, was once again busy about the house ministering to them!

The fame of that morning of teaching and healing spread throughout the city, and the multitudes gathered, carrying sick people, round about that door, and bringing demon-possessed men and women to be healed. Jesus went out, and healed many, casting out demons. The day being ended, He went to rest.

Early in the morning, while it was yet dark, Jesus rose from rest with great quietness, not to disturb the other sleepers; and leaving the house and Capernaum, climbed one of the wild desert heights outside the city for prayer.

These are the incidents. Let us now look at Jesus, carefully observing Him at His work. Four view-points are suggested. First, taking into account that early incident at Nazareth to which Mark makes no reference, we see Him facing His work. Journeying on from Nazareth, we watch His arrival in Capernaum, and observe the calling of His first comrades. Then we see Him in contact with men.

We next see Him in conflict with demons. Finally; we see Him, in the early hours of the following morning, in communion with God. When Jesus commenced His ministry, He came to men and identified Himself with them in the baptism of repentance; came to God, and received the attestation of the Father, following baptism; came to the under-world of evil in temptation, and mastered it. So now He is seen coming again to men as the Servant of God, coming again into the realm where demons held despotic sway over human souls and lives, coming again into quiet, close fellowship with God.

We first observe Him facing His work, when entering into Capernaum He called the disciples to Him. Nazareth had rejected Him. He had come to His own place, and His fellow townsmen would have none of Him. Now work was opening out before Him, and He called four men. The Servant of God, conscious of His rejection at Nazareth, suffering on account thereof, desired the fellowship of men in the enterprises of God. To Simon and Andrew, to James and John, He said, “Come ye after Me, and I will make you to become fishers of men,” He was the Son of man, the Saviour of men.

The master passion of His heart was that of the establishment of the Kingdom of God, and nothing interfered with that except men. But in order to the establishment of the Kingdom of God, man must not be destroyed. He said of His presence in the world, “I am not come to destroy, but to save.” He needed help.

These were the men He called. Simon, a man impulsive and wayward, lacking the principle which masters passion, and makes it strong. Andrew, His first Judaean disciple, James and John, brothers, but so different; the one a poet, a dreamer, attractive; and the other quiet, retiring, unknown. To these He said, “Come ye after Me, and I will make you to become fishers of men.”

“Fishers of men.” He employed this figure because they were all fishermen. To some men He would never say that. He did not say it to all the early disciples. There were others who were farm labourers. Therefore He also said, “The fields are white to harvest.” “Thrust in the sickle and reap.” He changed His figure according to the men to whom He wished to appeal. The principle underlying His call was that He called men to consecrate to His enterprises the capacity they had. Jesus is thus seen asking for comradeship; indicating the fact that when men are willing, He is able to fit them for the very comradeship in service to which He calls them.

On the Sabbath day, with its wonderful scenes, we observe Jesus dealing with men; teaching and healing. In these days of public ministry He went into synagogues for teaching, as in the earlier years of private life He had gone habitually for worship. The synagogue was the place of the gathering together of those of the Hebrew religion, the Jews who were true to the monotheistic idea, and desired to worship God. The synagogue unified the scattered peoples everywhere, if in no other way, by the very liturgy they employed. Jews in Capernaum, in Nazareth, and in all the cities, who could not reach the Temple, gathered at the same hour on the Sabbath day, using the same forms of worship.

A study of synagogue worship is a very interesting and profitable one. In passing we may observe that they who thus worshipped were forbidden to turn to the east. These synagogues usually faced the west, not only because, according to Ezekiel’s prophecy, there was a danger of idolatry in turning to the east, but also symbolically they were thus taught not to look in worship toward the place from whence religion came, but toward the place to which religion was intended to reach. It was the missionary attitude. Jesus went into these synagogues, and conformed to their habit and worship, as He had done through youth and young manhood in Nazareth. But now He went to teach.

Opportunity to do so was undoubtedly offered Him everywhere, in accordance with the custom of the time, for all Rabbis travelling were welcome to teach in the synagogues. He employed the opportunities which the synagogue and its assembled people offered, to preach the Gospel.

That which specially arrests our attention was the effect produced. Here at Capernaum, after the first Sabbath teaching, they were astonished, because He taught them with authority, and not as the scribes. The contrast is a very striking one in that it is unexpected. It is made here, and again later on. It is the contrast between Christ’s teaching, and the teaching to which the people had been accustomed. He taught them as having authority, and not as their scribes.

Now the scribes were the authoritative teachers. Their position was that of authority to teach the law and interpret it; to explain the Kingdom, to emphasize and insist upon the fact of the rule and reign of God, and to show how that rule was applied. The contrast was not between what they said, and what He said. It was a contrast between the effects produced by what they said, and by what He said. I do not agree with Edersheim when he suggests that the authority of Jesus was that of manner. Not that His manner lacked dignity.

I believe that physically Jesus was the most beautiful Man Who ever walked this earth. Marred with sorrow was His face undoubtedly, but far more perfect in form and feature than the highest dream of Greek sculptor ever led men to imagine man could be. His authority was not in His manner, nor in the thing He said; for He said nothing that had not been said before He came. Everything that He said may be found in germ in the Old Testament Scriptures.

Then wherein lay this authority? In the thing He said, as He said it, for He carried to the souls of men conviction that it was true. Stripped of all the things that hid, and all exposition that destroyed; the truth gripped men. It was not the authority of the law, it was not the authority of a manner, it was the authority of naked, eternal truth, uttered through an absolutely perfect Man. That is the authority of Jesus until this hour, and nothing is more marked than the continuity of that authority. Take some passage from His teaching, out of the Manifesto, or some casual word He spoke, and listen to it, and then ask this question, Is that true?

The only criticism ever offered of the teaching of Jesus worth any consideration, is that He gave men counsels of perfection, that His teachings were impracticable. There is no question as to their accuracy, or their truth. The hearts of men always respond to the truth. His was, and is, the authority of eternal, naked truth, from which there can be no escape. Some of the things He said search and scorch us. We want to escape, but we know that He is right.

This is one of the supreme proofs of the finality of Jesus. His authority is authority to the end of time. Only it must be remembered that the authority diminishes, if these records be lost. The authority of Christ is not the authority of what we think of Christ, for to-morrow we may think differently of Him. It is always the authority of the actual words so marvellously preserved for us; and never wholly apart from them is Christ authoritative to-day.

As we watch Him on that first Sabbath day, this authority arrests us; it is the authority of essential truth, coming out of eternity, and appealing to essential humanity; however humanity may have become blunted and dwarfed, it hears and knows the voice, and recognizes the authority.

Then beyond the teaching, there was healing. This healing ministry was twofold;-mental healing in His dispossession of those who were mastered by evil spirits; and bodily healing in His renewal of all bodily powers. These miracles of Jesus were not violations of natural order, but restorations to natural order. That man demon-possessed, was unnatural. Then said Jesus to the demon, “Be muzzled, and come out.” That woman in a burning fever, was unnatural; “He touched her, and the fever left her.” He did not violate order; but restored it.

Thus the Servant of God is seen moving out upon the pathway of service; first teaching men, for this is supreme, and touches the spirit life; and then healing mind and body, restoring natural conditions, in order to the fulfillment of life.

The last thing in this paragraph is full of beauty. To take the Greek words as they come: “And very early, while yet night, having risen up, He went out, and departed into a desert place, and there was praying.” That reveals the deliberate purposefulness of Jesus. The word “praying” here connotes far more than asking. It suggests the going forward in desire to God, not for God’s gifts only, but for God. It is the word for true worship, the word that describes the soul moving out toward God, desiring Him, and all He has to give.

It is impossible to read that statement and observe our Lord in the early hours of the morning, leaving behind Him the four men He had chosen as comrades, and the people He had healed in the city, to go into the desert place, without asking the nature of His communion with God. This Gospel has been introduced by the declaration that it is “The beginning of the Gospel” according to Isaiah. In the second part of the great prophecy of Isaiah, there is one paragraph which lights up this early morning hour, and Jesus at prayer. It is taken from the description of the Servant of God (Isaiah 50:4-7). “The Lord Jehovah hath given Me the tongue of them that are taught, that I may know how to sustain with words him that is weary: He wakeneth morning by morning, He wakeneth Mine ear to hear as they that are taught. The Lord Jehovah hath opened Mine ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away backward. I gave My back to the smiters, and My cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not My face from shame and spitting.

For the Lord Jehovah will help Me; therefore have I not been confounded: therefore have I set My face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame.” That passage suggests the nature of that early morning hour of communion. Let us ponder it carefully.

Mark 1:36-45

IV “To this end came I forth”- Mark 1:38. Mark 1:35-45 - Mark 2:1-12. THIS paragraph commences with the story of how the quietness of the morning watch of Jesus was broken in upon by the arrival of Simon and the rest of His disciples. The declaration made by the evangelist is really very striking; it means that they pursued Him, they hunted Him down. The word marks the anxiety and the eagerness of their search, and the almost terror that possessed them, when wakening in the morning, they found that Jesus was not in the house at Capernaum. Having found Him they said to Him, “All are seeking Thee,” a declaration revealing the effect produced in Capernaum by that wonderful Sabbath with its teaching, its healing of the demoniac, its healing of Peter’s wife’s mother, and that most wonderful eventide when they brought to Him all that were sick, and possessed with demons, and with apparent ease He healed the sicknesses, and cast the demons out.

In this paragraph we have an account of our Lord’s answer to the statement of His disciples, and the things that immediately followed. He was interrupted in His fellowship, but not disturbed by the interruption. Quietly He said to them, when they told Him that all in Capernaum were waiting for Him, “Let us go elsewhere into the next towns. . . for to this end came I forth.” A great lesson lies within that fact, its ultimate value being that converse with God prepares us for converse with men, and that a true fellowship with God is never selfish; it is willing to be interrupted when men need help. In their eagerness, their intense anxiety lest somehow He had departed, they hunted Him down, pursued Him until they found Him, and then with eagerness they said to Him, “All are seeking Thee.” He, with open ear was listening to God, and holding communion with Him in the secret place. With no perturbation of spirit, with no rebuke for these men, looking at them with great love and tenderness He said, Let us go elsewhere into the next towns, that I may preach there also; for to this end came I forth. The word “towns” is a singularly arresting one, occurring nowhere else in the New Testament, translated, “to the next village towns”; and perhaps more happily, “to the next country towns.” The reference was to the smaller towns that were not walled around completely, the little centers of population unified by the presence of a synagogue.

He told them that He must go to the other country towns. He had come to Capernaum, for Capernaum sat in the shadows of darkness and death; and He had opened His ministry there in the midst of night, but Capernaum must not detain Him. The other country towns needed His help; not the metropolis alone, but those other towns and cities scattered through Galilee; and not the towns only, but the unwalled villages. To this end came He forth.

The Sabbath in Capernaum had prepared the way for this wider ministry, for after the happenings in the synagogue, “the report of Him went out straightway everywhere into all the region of Galilee round about.” Mark records the fact of that first itinerary of our Lord in the briefest words: “He went into their synagogues throughout all Galilee, preaching and casting out demons.” No details are given. Then he gives two illustrative incidents, that of the cleansing of the leper; that of the forgiving of the sins, and the healing of the palsied man. These two incidents at the end of a general declaration, illuminate all that ministry.

The cleansing of the leper took place at the foot of the mountain after the giving of the Manifesto. Mark was not dealing with the King and the Lawgiver, but with the great Servant of God Who is Priest and Saviour; and so he did not record the Manifesto. Between the hour of His disturbance in worship, and the healing of the leper, there had been journeyings. The gap may be filled by turning to Matthew, and discovering from how far and wide an area the people had gathered to Him, flocked after Him. They had come from Judaea and Decapolis and from beyond Jordan. The crowds were flocking after Him everywhere; and there came a moment when, seeing the multitudes, He went into the mountain with His disciples, and sat and taught them, and gave them the Manifesto.

Immediately; following, as Matthew records, this leper came to Him. The other incident occurred when, after a period of absence from Capernaum, made necessary by the disobedience of the cleansed leper who published Him, Jesus went back into the city, and there in the house the palsied man was brought to Him, and He forgave and healed him.

Again endeavouring to observe the Lord Himself rather than the people about Him, or the incidents themselves, let us consider the text we have chosen, as revealing the inspiration of His ministry; and in the light of the context, as revealing the nature and power thereof. With all the lights and shadows of these two incidents playing about the Person of the Lord, let us listen to Him as He said, “To this end came I forth.” Let us attempt to discover the inspiration of Christ’s service as it is marked in the words, “Came I forth”; and secondly, the nature and power of His service as it is revealed in the incidents, and appears in the phrase, “To this end came I forth.”

The first meaning of the words of Jesus must detain us. There are two possible interpretations of His declaration, “Came I forth.” He either meant, I came forth from Capernaum, or, I came forth from God. The declaration was either purely local and geographical; or it was essential and eternal. The first interpretation, although given by many expositors, seems to me impossible and almost grotesque. I am in agreement with Morison when he says that “Such an interpretation . . . involves a sudden, arbitrary, and almost unpleasant descent to bathos.” Besides, it is not true to the simple story. Jesus did not leave Capernaum to preach, but to pray.

He did not go out in the early morning hour to seek the crowds, but to be away from them. He had not gone out in the early morning hour to reach cities, but to escape a city. He had gone out to have communion with God.

The second interpretation, which I resolutely adopt, is that upon this occasion in the simplest words, as the Servant of God He revealed the fact that He recognized that His ministry here in the world was dependent upon the fact that He had come out from God. He had been in the place of communion with God, His ear had been wakened by God to listen to the secrets which God had to speak to Him as His Self-emptied Servant, and now He said, To this end came I forth.

That interpretation is in harmony with His claims on other occasions, as chronicled specially by John, and with the revelation of the Servant of God in this Gospel. Whereas our Lord is presented by Mark stripped of His dignities, devoid of the purple, girded as a slave, for evermore under the compulsion of His service; yet constantly there are gleams of glory flaming forth and reminding us that the Servant of God is also the Son of God. The key-note of the Gospel struck by the evangelist in that opening word, “The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God,” finds its continuity in the harmonies as they run; for all the things of lowliness are combined with things of might; in the stories we see Him as the Self-emptied One, and yet as the One in Whom all the fullness of Deity dwells corporeally; the Kenosis of the Philippian letter, and the Pleroma of the Colossian letter are merged in this one Gospel.

We have already seen some of these gleams in the Divine attestation at His baptism; in the awful and agonized cry of the evil spirit in the synagogue, “I know Thee who Thou art, the Holy One of God”; in the wonderful power by which the demon was subdued; and in the power which had wrought so marvellously on that Sabbath evening. In all these there was a power and a dignity and a glory, which did not belong to man alone. Now in the chill dawn of the early morning, to those perturbed disciples He said in effect: I am not going back to Capernaum, though all men seek Me; because there are others waiting for Me. I must go and preach to them, because for that purpose came I forth. Whether they understood Him perfectly or not, the dignity of the assertion shows that He related His journeyings, His teaching, and the things He did by the way, to the eternal Purpose, to the Divine programme, to the Divine mission. “To this end came I forth.”

John chronicles how that once in the midst of His critics He said, “I came forth and am come from God”; and again in the seclusion of the upper room He said to His disciples, covering the whole fact of His mission, “I came out from the Father, and am come into the world; again, I leave the world, and go unto the Father.” In the light of these statements upon other occasions, we understand the text, “To this end came I forth.” The Self-emptied One had come forth from God. God had not left Him, and He had not left God in certain senses, for there came a day when He said, “I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent Me.” That was not the language of His Deity, but of His humanity. As a Man, God never left Him through all the years. He had all the privileges of fellowship with God during His human life as a Man that we have, and none other. He lived the life of relationship to God that every man may live. He had come forth from God, He had emptied Himself, He had left behind Him all the riches and glories and the mysteries of His essential and eternal relationship to God.

Yet carefully observe Him;-and this, illustrates the whole profound and tremendous theme; again and again He exercised the powers of Deity, which are the powers of sovereign supremacy, but never on His own behalf, it was always on behalf of others. He had come forth from God.

Therein we discover the strength of His purpose. The strength of His service lay in the complete abandonment of the Servant to the One Who commanded. He moved everywhere, not with the dignity of Deity, but with the dignity of the authority under which He served. He was in the world for a purpose. Jesus was never afraid of loneliness, never afraid of the desert places. He knew full well that naught could harm Him until His mission was accomplished, and His work was done. “Mine hour is not yet come,” He said to His enemies. That was not the language of God. God has no “hours.” His is the eternal “Now.” It was the language of the Servant Who knew God, and Who moved forward with a great sense of the authority of His mission, knowing that He was in the world for a purpose.

Very early in the morning He rose up, leaving the other sleepers undisturbed, and went out to prayer in the desert place. He prayed as a Man facing the task before Him, knowing that presently He must give His cheek to those that would pluck off the hair, and His back to the smiter. God communed with Him of the coming passion; and in resolute agreement, He set His face toward the goal. “To that end came I forth.” In that sentence is the key-note of His confidence, the secret of His strength, the unveiling of the power that made Him the prevailing Servant of God.

The immediate application follows. He said He was going to preach, to herald the Gospel; to proclaim it, which includes talking and working. He was going to herald the Gospel both by word and work in the nearest towns, Bethsaida, Chorazin, Dalmanutha, Magdala. He was going to a ministry of power and blessing, statistically a failure, spiritually a triumph.

We turn therefore to consider the nature and power of His service as it was revealed in the journey through Galilee, and especially in the two incidents.

The end to which He referred was that of heralding or proclaiming, and that of casting out. This is a most suggestive statement, covering the story of that ministry: “He went into their synagogues throughout all Galilee, preaching and casting out demons.” Mark shows what the Servant of God, when passing out of the place of communion with God, did in the presence of men, and in the presence of the underworld of evil. In fellowship with God in prayer He was interrupted but not disturbed. Then He went through all the towns and villages, “preaching and casting out demons.” His relation to men is suggested by the word “preaching.” His relation to the underworld of evil is suggested by the phrase, “casting out demons.” He was proclaiming the Gospel of God, and there were two notes therein; first, the Kingdom of God is a fact; secondly, it is nigh. Its nearness through Himself constituted the special note of good news that He came to proclaim to men. He went everywhere proclaiming this Kingdom and Gospel.

He illustrated both Kingdom and Gospel as He cast out demons. None of the other evangelists draws our attention so constantly to this power of Christ over the underworld of evil as does Mark. The first incident to which Mark drew attention, was that wrought in the synagogue when He cast the demon out. Doubtless He also healed the sick, for Matthew specifically declares that He did. But the thing that impressed Mark, as he looked at the Servant of God, was first of all His relationship to God in prayer; then as He went out to His work, His relationship to men, as He proclaimed the Kingdom and the Gospel of God; and finally His power over the underworld of evil, as He cast out demons.

To come to the incidents, and to watch the Lord: we observe Him first with the leper. He acted in two realms, those of health and holiness, showing their interrelationship. First He cleansed the leper; then He sent him to the priest with a definite and specific command that he should take with him the sacrifice or offerings which Moses commanded. In the second incident, that of the palsied man, the same two realms are manifested; first holiness, “Thy sins are forgiven”; secondly health, “Take tip thy bed and walk.”

Surveying the incidents in their entirety, and observing, not so much the man, nor the crowds about the Lord, but the Lord Himself at His work as the Servant of God, we are brought on both occasions into the presence of health and holiness, and their inter-relationship is marked.

In the first case He healed a leper; and then sent him to the priest for the fulfillment of those ceremonial offerings, which had to do with holiness. In the second case He forgave sins, and restored holiness to a soul; and then gave him health in the presence of criticism, thereby showing the inter-relationship between health of soul and health of body. It is Mark alone who tells us that when the leper came to meet Him at the foot of the mountain, after He had uttered the great Manifesto, He was moved with compassion. In our familiarity with some of the New Testament phrases, we are in danger of losing the sense of their value. “He was moved with compassion.” Let us try and see what He saw, when He looked at that leper, in order that we may the better understand His compassion. Observe the stage of leprosy that he had reached; that strange, awful stage of cleanness, due to hopeless corruption. The law of the leper is found in Leviticus (13 and 14); and to that law our Lord referred.

All the instructions given to the priest were for distinguishing between false and true leprosy, and afterwards for dealing with a man in whose case the awful fact of leprosy was established He must be segregated in certain stages of the disease; but when at last the disease had become all whiteness, when the man was entirely a leper, then he was clean, so far as contagion was concerned, and need ho longer be segregated. He might then mix again amongst men, for while the death sentence was on him, the period of contagion was over.

This man was in that condition. Later on in our Lord’s ministry ten lepers approached, but they did not come near Him. They stood at a distance and cried out. They were unclean lepers, in the early stages, of the disease when they must be segregated. This man was in the midst of a crowd, who undoubtedly loathed him, but who were in no danger from him. He came close to Christ, with all the whiteness of the ultimate corruption upon him; no hope for him in himself; no value in him to society. Jesus was moved with compassion, and the nature of His compassion was manifested in what followed. There is a very genuine compassion that recoils and shudders and passes on its way.

It is compassion, but it is not the compassion of Christ, it is not the compassion of God! “He was moved with compassion”; but there was no contempt for the man; there was no recoil from him. There was a forward step, and the hand was laid upon him, on the whiteness of his complete corruption! Jesus was not breaking law; for the period of contagion was passed. Or even if He were so doing, He was breaking it because He was superior to law, in that within Him purity was not negative merely, but positive. There had come from that mass of corruption a plaintive, pitiful cry, “Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean.” Immediately He advanced and touched him, and said, “I will,”-do not question My willingness;-“I will; be thou made clean.” His leprosy was instantly cleansed; not healed. The New Testament never speaks of the healing” of leprosy, always of cleansing, which is a profounder word.

He was then sent to the priest, sent back to the representative of that economy which was the Kingdom of God in foreshadowing, in order to obey the law of the leper. The moral and spiritual suggestiveness of that can only be discovered as the law of the leper is considered, in which in the ancient economy, if a man was cleansed of leprosy, there followed ceremonial functions that marked the necessity for sacrifice and cleansing from moral taint. Jesus said, “Go shew thyself to the priest”; thus linking the man’s cleansing or health, with his spiritual cleansing or holiness. Thus without argument or statement of philosophy, Christ revealed in a flash the fact that in all His ministry He recognized the union between material suffering and limitation, and spiritual disability and corruption.

Exactly the same things are found in the second of the pictures. The Revisers say, “They uncovered the roof.” Such a rendering is entirely misleading. The force of the word is that they broke up the roof of the house, tearing up the fabric, in order to lower the man down on his pallet into the presence of Jesus.

Again most carefully observe what He did. He looked into the man’s eyes, and said, “Son, thy sins are forgiven.” This was a word of absolution, a word of God. The Scribes were quite right when they said: “Who can forgive sins but One, even God?” They were wrong when they said: “Why doth this Man thus speak? He blasphemeth.” They did not know Him. He claimed that the authority which was that of God alone, was vested in Him as the Son of Man. At that point the title “Son of Man” emerges in this Gospel.

That title linked Him to other men, yet marked His relationship to God as the Self-emptied One Who laid aside the powers and attributes of Divine Sonship, and limited Himself within humanity as a perfect vehicle for the doing of the work of God. When they questioned Him, He proceeded to that which was the material result of holiness; the restoration to health of the bodily powers. That was the demonstration of the fact of holiness, and so also that the authority to forgive sins was logically vested in, and made possible through, the Son of man. “To this end came I forth.”

In all this is seen the value of the Kenosis, or Self-emptying of the Son of God as the condition for the redeeming activity of the fullness or Pleroma of Deity that operated through Him. He came forth emptying Himself, and now became the instrument through which power was proclaimed, and operated, on behalf of the Kingdom and the Gospel.

So far as we are permitted to speak or think of Him as the Pattern of our service for there are limitations in any such consideration-we may summarize the value of this paragraph by saying that it reveals the relation between prayer and power. He was praying in the early morning, and all the consequent influence followed upon that prayer. Prayer is listening for God, hearing what God has to say, consenting to what God does say, asking of God power to obey. To neglect these things is to be powerless when we meet the lepers, and the palsied men of the world. God, through the self-emptied, always pours out His fullness for the blessing of others; and prayer is the exercise finally of self-emptying that prepares the soul, that makes us channels through which the power of God may proceed to the accomplishment of His purposes in the world.