Mark’s Gospel • Chapter 6

See below for sermon notes and questions.

Questions to think about

• Can you think of a situation in the world that feels like a storm? What was Jesus' response to his friends' struggle in that storm?

• Does Jesus see us as subordinates? Or as co-workers? Servants or friends?

• Jesus looked at the crowd with compassion. His heart is moved to serve his people. How do you imagine Jesus looks at you?

• Is the call to repentance an ongoing one? Do we need to turn to Jesus way once in our life or every day?

Sermon notes

Context

In this gospel of Jesus Christ, we've seen the title character announced by John the Baptist and tested by Satan. He's preached repentance, called a band of followers, healed the sick and taught in parables and pictures. Great crowds are listening and following him around. Most recently we've seen him calm a storm, free a man with a demon and heal a woman and a little girl.

Mark writes his gospel with the spotlight firmly on Jesus. His focus is Jesus as the promised Messiah, the Son of God. But he writes in such a way that we always come away with the question, "What does it mean to FOLLOW him?" The disciples are prominent players in this story. You know those films with wild and crazy imagined worlds, like the Matrix, or Star Wars, or Avatar? Everything is so mind blowing in those movies that we need a normal character through which to view the craziness. Does that make sense? Someone we can relate to. I mean like Luke Skywalker in Star Wars - he's a homely farm boy who stumbles into this galactic adventure. Mr. Anderson in the Matrix - a software engineer who falls down the rabbit hole. We can see the disciples in this way too. Fishermen who are yanked out of the boat into a very un-normal life. They are the people we can imagine ourselves being in the story. That's what Mark wants. He wants us to engage with Jesus through the disciples. Let's bear that in mind as we read.

Jesus rejected at Nazareth

So far, Jesus has stayed in Galilee, moving between the sea and the mountains, spending time in villages and synagogues.

Now Jesus heads back to his hometown, Nazareth. Not the place where he was born, but where he grew up. His disciples follow him.

So now it's the Sabbath, and Jesus has been given the honour of reading and teaching from the Hebrew Bible. The villagers had heard about the healings and miracles in the surrounding region, around the Sea of Galilee, and now they are hearing him teach in person. Their very own Jesus. Mary and Joseph's boy. It's the homecoming tour. It's a U2 gig in Dublin. A Beatles gig in Liverpool.

They hear him teaching with great wisdom in their synagogue. How do they respond? They say, "Who does he think he is? Isn't he Mary's boy? The carpenter's son?" They want to put him in a box. They take offence at him.

Jesus is as surprised at their unbelief as we are. Their lack of faith means they don't receive the blessing that other nearby towns have. Only a few people get healed.

And Jesus leaves the town and moves about the villages in the region, teaching.

Jesus sends out the twelve

He's gone from village to village teaching before, but this time it's different. This time he sends the disciples out too. He commissions them with authority. They are acting as his representatives. What's the mission? He sends them with a message of repentance.

What does that word even mean? When was the last time you heard someone say "repent" outside of a religious setting? It's not a word we commonly use. What would the villagers have understood by that word?

The language of Mark's gospel is ancient Greek, and in Greek, the word here is "metanoia". It wasn't a word used just for spiritual change, but it was used to talk about any changed decision or changed mind - usually in light of new information. So for example, I have my heart set on a new Volkswagen Golf, but then i hear the gearboxes can go wrong and be expensive to replace, so - metanoia - I change my mind in the light of this news.

As Jesus has been proclaiming, the disciples tell people they should change their mind, their way. They should return to the God of their ancestors. What's the news that changes everything? Jesus. They come in his name. His power. His kingdom is breaking in. Demons are fleeing and the body is made well.

It's a message that has been sounded throughout Israel's history. The Old Testament is full of calls to turn back to God.

So, the people around Nazareth hear this message. What can't they do? They can't ignore it. It's a message of change. You can't hear it say, that's nice. It's a message you have to actively reject or actively accept. It's an in your face message. If you ignore it, you reject it. Imagine I call you at work and say your tap has been left on in your bathroom. You would repent, right? You'd go home and sort it out. You'd repent. Unless you didn't believe me, or trust me. One thing you can't do is say, thanks Dave, I'll think about it. It requires action.

What should the disciples do if people reject the disciples and their message? They should wipe the dust off their feet and leave. This is something a Jew might do on coming back into Israel after being in a pagan country. The message is clear. If you reject the disciples you reject Jesus and you put yourself on the wrong side of Jesus' judgement.

So, the disciples go out and start the work. What happens next? Well, we don't know because here the scene changes.

Herod hears about Jesus, thinks it's John back from the dead

We're no longer with Jesus and the disciples, but with Herod, puppet king of the Jews under the Romans. Now here's a man who definitely doesn't respond to the message of repentance.

Herod has heard about Jesus and he's concerned. Afraid. He thinks it's John the Baptist back from the dead.

Wait, John's dead? Last we heard from him he was happy eating locusts and honey.

Turns out that John IS dead. Mark gives us the back story.

Herod's wife (Herodias - who used to be Herod's brother's wife) really didn't like John on account of his condemnation of their marriage. Herod put John in prison, it seems to keep him safe from her. But she was a crafty one and planned John's execution with the help of her daughter. We end up with Herod forced to have John beheaded to save face in front of his friends.

Remember, Mark's mentioning this to tell us that Herod thought that Jesus was John the Baptist back from the dead.

And now we return to the story of the disciples.

Jesus feeds the 5000

They come back, excited and tired out from their trekking and preaching and healing and delivering. They catch up. Tell each other their stories. You can just see Jesus smiling, proud.

And their mission has had an effect: people have followed them to Jesus. So many people were bustling around them they couldn't even get a moment to eat. Two nearby towns (Bethsaida and Capernaum had around 2000 people each). There's at least 5000 here. This was a crazy big crowd. Middlesbrough and Stockton have 220,000 people between them. Imagine a crowd that size. They get into the boat and Jesus takes them to a quiet place.

Except it's not quiet anymore. People saw where they were going and ran ahead. You can sense the disciples' frustration as Jesus starts teaching these people.

The disciples try to get rid of them, telling Jesus to send them away for food. But Jesus tells the disciples to feed them. They are so frustrated now. "What, spend a years' salary on bread?"

To be fair to the disciples, would you respond any differently? The penny hadn't yet fully dropped that Jesus was in fact God's Son - the implications of that were yet to sink in. So they do the maths and of course come to the conclusion that this crowd needs to go. But in doing the maths, they missed an element. Just like I always did in maths lessons. They worked out the formula but missed out the "x". Jesus is the incalculable factor in this story.

This story with the 5000 is really key in Mark's gospel. Remember how the Old Testament keeps pointing forward longingly to One who would be the true Moses, the true Elijah, the true leader of Israel who would change everything? It's like the Old Testament keeps asking "where is he"? Well, Mark's presented this story of the 5000 in such a way that these questions find a surprising answer in the man who is looking with compassion on the crowds.

• They were like sheep without a shepherd - Jesus is the shepherd that Moses prayed for in Numbers 27:17 and that God promised would come to enable the people to "dwell securely in the wilderness." (Ezekiel 34) Where are Jesus, the disciples and the people? The wilderness. The readers of Mark's gospel would be familiar with this imagery and understand its significance. The people who heard the disciples preaching and followed them to seek Jesus are the new Exodus. As one commentator puts it, "The time of rest in the wilderness has come when the Son of God establishes meal-fellowship with his people.

• How will we feed them? Echoes Moses' question in the wilderness - "Where shall I find meat to give to all these people?" (Numbers 11:13)

• Jesus commands them to sit on the green grass - echoes which Psalm? Psalm 23 - He makes me lie down in green pastures.

• He makes them sit in 50s and 100s - echoes the organisation of Israel's camp in the desert (Exodus 18:21)

• The way the food just multiplies echoes back to the days of Elijah and Elisha who saw God provide mysteriously never-ending food.

All of these echoes join together to point the disciples - and the reader - to the conclusion that Jesus is the Messiah, the second Moses, who is bringing his people into rest and salvation. The Kingdom of God is coming and the person who's bringing that Kingdom is none other than God himself in the person of Jesus.

Jesus walks on water

Jesus gives his disciples the chance to get some rest while he dismisses the crowd.

But a storm blows and the disciples are in difficulty again. Jesus goes out to them walking on the water.

Again, imagine you are the disciples. What would you feel in that situation? What would you think?

I love the comment that Mark adds at the end of this: And they were utterly astounded, for they did not understand about THE LOAVES, but their hearts were hardened. THE LOAVES? What was it about the bread incident that made them miss the point here?

Well, if they understood the miracle of the loaves they would see Jesus as the Sovereign Lord who calms storms and even walks on them.

Jesus heals the sick in Gennesaret

In Chapter 7 we see Jesus heading north to the coast of the Mediterranean. This little passage we have here now serves as a bit of a summary of his time in Galilee. As we've seen, the kingdom of God is breaking in with power. People's lives are being radically changed. Jesus is calling people to turn to him.

This story brings us in. We often feel like the disciples, right, who found it difficult to understand who Jesus was even as he was standing with them. We are being called to faith. Called to see who Jesus REALLY is.