Reflective Bible Study Gospel Adventure

The Top Commandment: Mark 12:28-34

Published December 11, 2024 in Written Journal Entries

Focus Passage: Mark 12:28-34 (NIrV)

²⁸One of the teachers of the law came and heard the Sadducees arguing. He noticed that Jesus had given the Sadducees a good answer. So he asked him, “Which is the most important of all the commandments?”

²⁹Jesus answered, “Here is the most important one. Moses said, ‘Israel, listen to me. The Lord is our God. The Lord is one. ³⁰Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. Love him with all your mind and with all your strength.’ — (Deuteronomy 6:4, 5) ³¹And here is the second one. ‘Love your neighbor as you love yourself.’ — (Leviticus 19:18) There is no commandment more important than these.”

³²“You have spoken well, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one. There is no other God but him. ³³To love God with all your heart and mind and strength is very important. So is loving your neighbor as you love yourself. These things are more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”

³⁴Jesus saw that the man had answered wisely. He said to him, “You are not far from God’s kingdom.”

From then on, no one dared to ask Jesus any more questions.

Read Mark 12:28-34 in context and/or in other translations on BibleGateway.com!

If you have ever wondered what the most important thing you should do is, or if you ever wanted to ask Jesus what should be your number one focus, you are not alone. As it turns out, there were a group of Pharisees, or at least one Pharisee, who had the same question, but while the Pharisees were more interested in setting a trap for Jesus, the response that Jesus gives is very powerful.

Part of me wonders if this Pharisee was sincere with his question, since this is one of the few places Jesus seems to give a direct answer when challenged, or perhaps Jesus is using this as another opportunity to teach truth to the crowd.

Either way, Jesus’ response is very profound. The top commandment, if we were to organize them into a hierarchy, is simple: “The Lord is our God. The Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. Love him with all your mind and with all your strength.” (Verses 29b-30)

While Jesus quickly adds the second most important commandment, too often people interpret this most important commandment in light of what the second one is. This leads to the idea that we love God by loving others.

While loving others is important, and it is one way to love God, this top commandment is cheapened and distorted by narrowing it to this one viewpoint. We miss the big truth that God revealed through Moses initially, and then through Jesus repeating Moses’ words.

This commandment begins with a declaration: “The Lord is our God.” This tells me that first we must accept God to be our God. It is only when we have intentionally chosen Him that we will then be able to obey this command.

Next is another declaration: “The Lord is one.” This tells me that God is singular, and that loving/following/serving Him does not divide our interests between multiple places, but instead it unifies our actions/direction onto one purpose: serving one God. One God also unifies diverse groups of people. While many people have differing ideas about God, one God allows people to unite together under that heading instead of being divided like the other nations/religions were at that time.

Only after having accepted God to be our God, and acknowledging that He is singular and worthy of being the top priority in our lives are we then able to truly love Him with our heart, soul, mind, and strength.

Loving God with our heart is like loving your spouse or your children. It is an inner love that grows as a relationship develops.

Loving God with our soul is like attaching Him to our identity and/or our being. The label of “Christian” should be worn proudly as a badge of honor as we seek to be representatives and models of Christ-likeness to a world that doesn’t understand.

Loving God with our mind is like choosing to focus our intellect on learning more about Him. This is not skeptical science from a naturalistic viewpoint but a true desire to understand what nature, the world, and life tell us about our Creator.

Loving God with our strength is like stepping out towards Him in confidence, and by moving towards the path and life He created each of us to live. Someone who truly loves God will not be silent or stagnant, they will be active and helping others where they are able to.

God’s top commandment is not easy, but it is powerful. It is not painless, but it is rewarding. It is not trouble free, but it is what God has called us to do.

This thought was inspired by studying the Walking With Jesus “Reflective Bible Study” package. To discover insights like this in your own study time, click here and give Reflective Bible Study a try today!

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Sheep among Wolves: Luke 10:1-20

Published December 10, 2024 in Written Journal Entries

Focus Passage: Luke 10:1-20 (NCV)

¹After this, the Lord chose seventy-two others and sent them out in pairs ahead of him into every town and place where he planned to go. ²He said to them, “There are a great many people to harvest, but there are only a few workers. So pray to God, who owns the harvest, that he will send more workers to help gather his harvest. ³Go now, but listen! I am sending you out like sheep among wolves. ⁴Don’t carry a purse, a bag, or sandals, and don’t waste time talking with people on the road. ⁵Before you go into a house, say, ‘Peace be with this house.’ ⁶If peace-loving people live there, your blessing of peace will stay with them, but if not, then your blessing will come back to you. ⁷Stay in the same house, eating and drinking what the people there give you. A worker should be given his pay. Don’t move from house to house. ⁸If you go into a town and the people welcome you, eat what they give you. ⁹Heal the sick who live there, and tell them, ‘The kingdom of God is near you.’ ¹⁰But if you go into a town, and the people don’t welcome you, then go into the streets and say, ¹¹‘Even the dirt from your town that sticks to our feet we wipe off against you. But remember that the kingdom of God is near.’ ¹²I tell you, on the Judgment Day it will be better for the people of Sodom than for the people of that town.

¹³“How terrible for you, Korazin! How terrible for you, Bethsaida! If the miracles I did in you had happened in Tyre and Sidon, those people would have changed their lives long ago. They would have worn rough cloth and put ashes on themselves to show they had changed. ¹⁴But on the Judgment Day it will be better for Tyre and Sidon than for you. ¹⁵And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted up to heaven? No! You will be thrown down to the depths!

¹⁶“Whoever listens to you listens to me, and whoever refuses to accept you refuses to accept me. And whoever refuses to accept me refuses to accept the One who sent me.”

¹⁷When the seventy-two came back, they were very happy and said, “Lord, even the demons obeyed us when we used your name!”

¹⁸Jesus said, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. ¹⁹Listen, I have given you power to walk on snakes and scorpions, power that is greater than the enemy has. So nothing will hurt you. ²⁰But you should not be happy because the spirits obey you but because your names are written in heaven.”

Read Luke 10:1-20 in context and/or in other translations on BibleGateway.com!

Part way through Jesus’ ministry, He sends His followers out on a short missionary trip to the surrounding towns to preach the good news about God with the people in that area. During His instructions to them before sending them out, Jesus shares an interesting word-picture that may describe how He wants all of His followers to be.

Luke shares Jesus word picture when He tells us Jesus said, “Go now, but listen! I am sending you out like sheep among wolves.” (v. 3)

This is a profound word picture because it does not give the picture of safety. Jesus did not call His followers into a life filled with safety and security. (Actually, in one way He did, because Jesus secures our future lives in heaven and our eternity is safe with Him. In this instance, I am referring to our lives here on earth during the present age.)

Jesus calls us to be “like sheep among wolves”. I doubt Jesus intended for this illustration to prompt us to huddle in groups awaiting persecution from the “wolves” of the world. I do think Jesus shared this illustration because sheep are peaceful, sheep are calm (unless frightened), and sheep are not aggressive.

When we look at God’s ideal for how His people should live, behave, and act, I believe peaceful, calm, and not aggressive are all character attributes He would want us to possess. This means that an aggressive, mean, domineering Christian might remind me more of a wolf living in the world than a sheep Jesus is challenging to go into the world.

Jesus describes His disciples as sheep, and I believe this is because God wants His followers to be more sheep-like in our behavior rather than wolf-like. We should model peace, calm, love, and community in our own lives and avoid modeling our lives after the aggressive, predatory nature of a wolf that many in culture display.

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Flashback Episode — The Disciples’ Witness: Mark 16:15-20

Published December 9, 2024 in Audio Journal Entries

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As we begin our last regular episode in our year focusing in on Mark’s gospel, we turn our attention onto the last portion of Mark’s gospel’s longer conclusion. As I shared more fully in our last two episodes, scholars have doubts about whether Mark wrote this conclusion or whether this conclusion was added by a scribe later on because Mark’s gospel didn’t seem to have an ending or its original ending was lost.

However, even if Mark didn’t write this conclusion to his gospel, we can learn some powerful insights in how the author of this conclusion summarized the last events in Jesus’ life.

In the last half of this conclusion, we turn our attention to the last great commission Jesus gives to the disciples. While many people focus in on Matthew’s version of Jesus’ great commission, the way the author of Mark’s gospel’s longer conclusion frames Jesus’ message is powerful to focus in on.

With that said, let’s read what this author wrote. Our passage for this episode is found at the end of Mark’s gospel, in chapter 16, and we will read from the New Century Version. Starting in verse 15:

¹⁵Jesus said to his followers, “Go everywhere in the world, and tell the Good News to everyone. ¹⁶Anyone who believes and is baptized will be saved, but anyone who does not believe will be punished. ¹⁷And those who believe will be able to do these things as proof: They will use my name to force out demons. They will speak in new languages. ¹⁸They will pick up snakes and drink poison without being hurt. They will touch the sick, and the sick will be healed.”

¹⁹After the Lord Jesus said these things to his followers, he was carried up into heaven, and he sat at the right side of God. ²⁰The followers went everywhere in the world and told the Good News to people, and the Lord helped them. The Lord proved that the Good News they told was true by giving them power to work miracles.

In this last section of Mark’s longer conclusion, we see a number of signs shared that tell us God was with the earlier disciples. This conclusion draws our attention to the miracles that those who believed would be able to do, such as forcing out demons, speaking in new languages, picking up snakes and drinking poison without being hurt, and healing the sick by simply touching them.

While some of the things in Mark’s conclusion’ list the disciples did while they were with Jesus, this seems like a strangely specific list that draws more heavily on the details we find in the book of Acts. While Jesus could have easily predicted this, it seems a little too detailed when we compare it with Jesus’ commissions to His disciples in the other gospels. This list also doesn’t leave room for other ways that God could confirm the message of the gospel.

Perhaps this is just the translation that we are using, but it seems unlike Jesus to use miracles to prove to people that the message they are receiving is from God. This runs counter to both Jesus refusing to offer people in that generation a miracle that proved He was the Messiah, and this runs counter to Jesus’ warning to not blindly believe messages from people who perform signs and wonders.

If we read the portions describing the signs in this great commission and conclusion using the New American Standard Bible, which is the translation we used in our last episode, it describes these miracles in this way: “These signs will accompany those who have believed” is how the miracles are introduced. Verse 20 concludes this message by saying “And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them, and confirmed the word by the signs that followed.”

While the New American Standard Bible does not use the word prove, it still frames the way these signs were given as being confirmation of the message. I don’t think I ever noticed this before, but while signs could be given to confirm a message, I don’t see this being Jesus’ model.

Instead, all the miracles Jesus did throughout His ministry were used to help people God loves and to cause people to pay attention, but Jesus intended for His ministry to stand on the words and message that He preached. When the disciples traveled around following Jesus’ return to heaven, the miracles they did helped those God loved, and caused people to take note. The disciples’ ministry and the good news they shared was intended to stand on its own.

This is significant for us to pay attention to for two reasons.

First, if God’s messages will always be validated by miracles, then we have centuries and millennia of messages that can easily be doubted. This includes many of the messages God gave through the prophets in the Old Testament. The Old Testament prophets’ messages were rarely if ever confirmed through miracles. If we set miracles up as a test for whether to confirm whether a message is from God or not, then we will have a good percentage of God’s messages throughout history that could then be claimed to not be inspired. God wouldn’t want this.

Secondly, using miracles as a test sets us up to be deceived if a message is false but a miracle confirms it. If Satan wanted to come to deceive, he would have no difficulty doing things that would appear miraculous. Satan could come helping people, teaching positive, humanitarian messages, and perform miracles and millions would be set up to be deceived simply because they used the miracles as their guide and not the previously revealed truth of scripture. Miracles are capable of being done by both good and evil angels, and because of this, they are a poor test for whether we should trust a messenger.

I wonder if this is why my New American Standard Bible footnotes hinted at theological challenges included in this longer ending of Mark’s gospel. Jesus’ teaching doesn’t suggest we should put much spiritual weight on a miracle worker. Instead, when we see miracles, we should take note, but then judge the value of the message this miracle worker is sharing based on the truth that is included in the Bible.

While Mark’s ending is questionable, and while I can understand why some scholars are concerned with what it suggests, the big truth we should hold on to in this conclusion is that God is with His people.

Jesus’ followers spread the great news of the gospel message, and God went with them as they shared Jesus with everyone they met. Jesus’ early followers dedicated their lives to sharing Jesus with people – even going so far as dying for their faith! I wholeheartedly believe that we are called to share Jesus like these first followers of Jesus shared Him, and that when we step out in faith, we will discover God is with us, helping us every step of the way!

As we come to the end of another podcast episode, here are the challenges I will leave you with:

As I always challenge you to do, continue to seek God first in your life and let Him lead and guide you as you move through life. Choose to place your faith, hope, trust, and belief in Jesus and in His sacrifice to cover your sins.

Also, continue to pray and study the Bible for yourself to discover firsthand what the Bible teaches. Knowing the Bible is our best defense when discerning truth from error, and when we prayerfully study the Bible, we open our hearts and minds to what God wants to teach us from His Word!

And as I end every set of challenges by saying in one way or another, never stop short of, back away from, chicken out of, or give up on where God wants to lead you to in your life with Him!

Flashback Episode: Year in Mark – Episode 50: In the last part of the extended conclusion to Mark’s gospel, discover what happened when the disciples let the Holy Spirit enter and transform their lives, and why it might not be a good idea to let miracles be a test for determining spiritual truth.

Deciding for Ourselves: Luke 12:35-59

Published December 6, 2024 in Written Journal Entries

Focus Passage: Luke 12:35-59 (NCV)

³⁵ “Be dressed, ready for service, and have your lamps shining. ³⁶ Be like servants who are waiting for their master to come home from a wedding party. When he comes and knocks, the servants immediately open the door for him. ³⁷ They will be blessed when their master comes home, because he sees that they were watching for him. I tell you the truth, the master will dress himself to serve and tell the servants to sit at the table, and he will serve them. ³⁸ Those servants will be blessed when he comes in and finds them still waiting, even if it is midnight or later.

³⁹ “Remember this: If the owner of the house knew what time a thief was coming, he would not allow the thief to enter his house. ⁴⁰ So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at a time when you don’t expect him!”

⁴¹ Peter said, “Lord, did you tell this story to us or to all people?”

⁴² The Lord said, “Who is the wise and trusted servant that the master trusts to give the other servants their food at the right time? ⁴³ When the master comes and finds the servant doing his work, the servant will be blessed. ⁴⁴ I tell you the truth, the master will choose that servant to take care of everything he owns. ⁴⁵ But suppose the servant thinks to himself, ‘My master will not come back soon,’ and he begins to beat the other servants, men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk. ⁴⁶ The master will come when that servant is not ready and is not expecting him. Then the master will cut him in pieces and send him away to be with the others who don’t obey.

⁴⁷ “The servant who knows what his master wants but is not ready, or who does not do what the master wants, will be beaten with many blows! ⁴⁸ But the servant who does not know what his master wants and does things that should be punished will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded. And from the one trusted with much, much more will be expected.

⁴⁹ “I came to set fire to the world, and I wish it were already burning! ⁵⁰ I have a baptism to suffer through, and I feel very troubled until it is over. ⁵¹ Do you think I came to give peace to the earth? No, I tell you, I came to divide it. ⁵² From now on, a family with five people will be divided, three against two, and two against three. ⁵³ They will be divided: father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.”

⁵⁴ Then Jesus said to the people, “When you see clouds coming up in the west, you say, ‘It’s going to rain,’ and it happens. ⁵⁵ When you feel the wind begin to blow from the south, you say, ‘It will be a hot day,’ and it happens. ⁵⁶ Hypocrites! You know how to understand the appearance of the earth and sky. Why don’t you understand what is happening now?

⁵⁷ “Why can’t you decide for yourselves what is right? ⁵⁸ If your enemy is taking you to court, try hard to settle it on the way. If you don’t, your enemy might take you to the judge, and the judge might turn you over to the officer, and the officer might throw you into jail. ⁵⁹ I tell you, you will not get out of there until you have paid everything you owe.”

Read Luke 12:35-59 in context and/or in other translations on BibleGateway.com!

Part way through Jesus’ ministry as He is teaching those who are following Him, He asks those present a rhetorical question, and then backs up the question with an illustration. When reading this, I often miss the question in favor of focusing on the illustration. I imagine many of us can understand the illustration easier than the question Jesus asked immediately before it.

Near the end of Luke’s description of Jesus sermon that started by focus on being good servants, He describes Jesus asking those present, “Why can’t you decide for yourselves what is right? If your enemy is taking you to court, try hard to settle it on the way. If you don’t, your enemy might take you to the judge, and the judge might turn you over to the officer, and the officer might throw you into jail. I tell you, you will not get out of there until you have paid everything you owe.” (v. 57-59)

When reading this, I can completely understand the motivation to settle a dispute before it reaches court, because courtrooms have clear winners and clear losers – and the losers in a courtroom setting can face big fines, go to prison, or even face both of these.

But when I read this in the context of Jesus’ rhetorical question, it makes a little less sense. Should we understand Jesus to be telling those present that truth is subjective to the people having the discussion?

In my own mind, I don’t think Jesus describes this, but instead I believe He is challenging His followers, both those present at that time as well as everyone living afterwards, to be intentional about communicating with one another. When we turn off communication in a relationship, the relationship ceases to exist. A relationship isn’t much of a relationship when there is no communication involved. Lack of communication will kill a relationship faster than great distance.

When challenging those present to decide for themselves what is right, I think Jesus is also challenging these people, as well as everyone who ever lived after this point, that they must make a decision regarding who they believe Him to be. There is no room to be on the fence when it comes to deciding who Jesus is, and once we have made the decision, if it is to side with Jesus, we must be intentional about keeping communication with Him strong. This is done through prayer, Bible study, and regular time spent resting with Him.

When faced with sin, and the realization that Satan is eager to accuse, condemn, and sentence us, it would be wise for us to choose Jesus, and decide for ourselves to place our hope, faith, trust, and belief in Him, because Jesus has offered us His life as a replacement for our own. Jesus’ life was perfect, and with Jesus’ life standing in place of our own, we will be saved for eternity!

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