Twist family Bible study: the Gospel of Mark

[Wayne]

So on to Mark chapter 4! So many people have come to hear Jesus speak that he has to go out on a boat while they listen from the shore.

He goes into parable mode. A sower sows some seeds, but for one reason or another, lots of seeds don't make it. But the ones that do yield a harvest of 30, 60, or 100 times what was sown.

[Wayne]

One passage doesn't sound as compassionate as I would like.

At least in some translations, Jesus seems to be pleased that some people can't understand what he's saying.   

Funny, I just checked my Dad's King James and he had circled this verse, Mark 4:12. He didn't mark a lot of things -  maybe it annoyed him too.   

-- 11 ... unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables:

12 That seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they may hear, and not understand; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them.

[Wayne]

There's an interesting cross-reference in the New American Standard Version though...

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=mark%204:12;&version=49;

This passage is roughly a quotation from both Isaiah and Ezekiel. I suspect that Mark (or whoever the writer was) put this phrase in to show the parallel to the prophets' experience.

I don't think they had anything like quotation marks in the original Greek to indicate explicitly the words that Jesus said as opposed to Mark's annotations, so I'm willing to give Jesus the benefit of the doubt on this one.

[Wayne]

Also as we've noticed, Jesus had to watch what he said, so folding his message into parables was a way to deliver the message without explicitly saying anything the authorities could arrest him for.

verse 34:  He did not speak to them without a parable; but He was explaining everything privately to His own disciples.

[Wayne]

The coolness of Wikipedia:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_4

This is the chapter where Jesus calms the storm...

The disciples are surprised at Jesus's superpowers: Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?

[injest]

ok, my interpretation of that verse? I think he was talking about hypocrites....people that came around and listened but didn't truly take in the message to heart...

or maybe I am completely off base....everything is so intertwined...I tend to be more literal in my reading. 

[injest]

curious though. In the entire book that is the only verse  italiazed?

[Wayne]

I prefer Mark's version of the mustard seed story over another story that appears in Matthew and Luke (which get a lot more air time!     )

30-31 ... the kingdom of God ... is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the soil, though it is smaller than all the seeds that are upon the soil,

32 yet when it is sown, it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and forms large branches; so that the birds of the air can nest under its shade.

In the other mustard story in Matthew and Luke, the mustard seed is referred to merely as something that happens to be small.

Matthew 17:19-20: "if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you"

Luke 17:5-6 "If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you."

In the versions presented in Matthew and Luke, Jesus might as well have said "faith the size of a grain of sand."

But in Mark's version, Jesus was not referring to something with a small amount of faith. He was referring to something small that had a great amount of faith, and through that faith it performs great actions.

[Wayne]

everything is so intertwined

  Evenin Miz Jess!   absolutely! This is just my own thought at the moment. Yours is at least as valid as if not more so!     

[injest]

I prefer Mark's version of the mustard seed story over Matthew and Luke's (which get a lot more air time!     )

30-31 ... the kingdom of God ... is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the soil, though it is smaller than all the seeds that are upon the soil,

32 yet when it is sown, it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and forms large branches; so that the birds of the air can nest under its shade.

In Matthew and Luke, the mustard seed is referred to merely as something that happens to be small.

Matthew 17:19-20: "if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you"

Luke 17:5-6 "If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you."

In the versions presented in Matthew and Luke, Jesus might as well have said "faith the size of a grain of sand."

But in Mark's version, Jesus was not referring to something with a small amount of faith. He was referring to something small that had a great amount of faith, and through that faith it performs great actions.

and that grows and grows. That if you give it a chance it can become something so much more.