In today’s Bible reading, we hear how Jesus left Galilee to travel to Tyre and Sidon. These Phoenician cities on the Mediterranean coast were outside of the jurisdiction of Herod Antipas and they were largely non-Jewish, howbeit there would be a significant presence of those Hellenized Jews who constituted a general diaspora [ … ]
Through The Year | The Gospels | Bible Verse Of The Day
Daily Bible Verses | Purity Rituals | Honour Your Father And Mother | Christian Family Values | Jesus And The Commandments
In today’s Bible reading, we see clearly that many of those to whom Mark addresses his Gospel would not be familiar with Jewish customs. Mark, therefore, explains that the Jews wash as a ritual of purification prior to eating. This was initially a prescription for how priests should wash before offering sacrifice – see Exodus 30: 17ff – and was extended by tradition to all Jews before every meal. It may be helpful for us to remember that this was not a matter of hygiene; rather ritual purification was a symbol of the moral purity a person should have when approaching God. We may also consider our own practice of washing our hands and saying grace before meals, such that our participating in a meal becomes an act of thanksgiving to God, the meal a sacred space [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Heals At Gennesaret | Christian Faith And Healing | Witness Jesus | Suffer Faith | God The Son
After the feeding of the five thousand, Jesus has gone into the hills alone to pray, while his disciples begin to cross over the Sea of Galilee ahead of him. Jesus has walked across the sea to join his disciples, who cannot comprehend what is happening and who Jesus truly is [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Miraculous Catch Of Fish And The Calling Of The First Disciples | Fishers Of Men | King James Audio Bible KJV
Luke’s Gospel places the calling of the first disciples after the fame of Jesus has already spread across the region. Simon Peter listens to Jesus’ words, then he experiences the miraculous catch of fish, and then he throws himself down before Jesus, acknowledging his sins and placing his life in Jesus’ hands. This is Simon Peter’s call. He gives away everything he has to follow Jesus [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus The Good Shepherd | The People’s Need | Jesus’ Care And Love For His Disciples | A Desert Place
The apostles have returned exhausted and energized to Jesus. They have succeeded in their mission and they are full of the glory of what they have accomplished. They long to tell Jesus all that they have done in Jesus’ name. This is a triumph for the disciples. They long to share [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Martyrdom Of John the Baptist | Herod The Tetrarch | Herodias | Sin And Evil In The Bible | A Roman Client King
Herod the tetrarch, Herod Antipas, the son of Herod the Great, was a client ‘king’ of the Romans. He is highly alert to the in/stability of his region and to his own position within the Roman authority. We may imagine that the fear of a popular leader amassing a following and potentially threatening authority contributed to the arrest of John the Baptist, this in addition to the reason we are given in the Gospel, which is that John had told Herod how immoral he was being in marrying his brother’s wife Herodias [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Mission Of Jesus’ Disciples | Power Of Exorcism | Trust In God Verse | Scriptures On Trusting God
In a time and in a land where different communities lived side by side yet non-communicatively, fearing, suspecting and disliking one another, and often bound by religious laws telling them not to interact, it is all the more extraordinary that Jesus tells his disciples to trust in life, in providence, in strangers’ hospitality, as they travel throughout the lands, as it would now be internationally, healing people and preaching the Gospel [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jairus’ Daughter Restored To Life | Curing The Woman With The Haemorrhage | Healing Miracles Of Jesus
It is astonishing to consider that, in all the clamour, in the midst of all the crowd of people, all begging for a piece of our Lord, there should be as it were a special cordon, a sacred space surrounding Lord Jesus, into which the clamour for attention does not pass, such that Jesus passes untouched through the chaos, inviolable – yet one poor woman has the faith to reach out and touch Lord Jesus [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Exorcism | The Man Possessed By Devils And The Herd Of Swine | In The Country Of The Gadarenes | Neighbours In Jesus Christ
Our Lord Jesus’ visit to this particular part of the coast of the Sea of Galilee is brief. In today’s reading, Jesus alights in an area which is largely non-Jewish, as is evident in the huge herd of pigs that is here. It seems quite alien territory. We are reminded of just how very different communities existed in relatively close proximity around Galilee (also known as: The Sea of Tiberias; Lake Gennesaret), and we might think of how between those different communities there would be distrust, dislike, silence, even outright hatred. It is very beautiful to see Jesus passing between communities, and especially outside of his own Jewish community. There is a lesson for all time here against sectarianism. We are reminded that Jesus’ message is offered to all, perhaps especially when we find ourselves in strange lands [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Calming Of The Storm | Christian Faith | Symbolic Meaning In The Gospels | Signs And Wonders
Reading Mark’s Gospel, we have a wonderful sense of just how active and mobile Jesus’ ministry around Galilee was. The words ‘immediately’ and ‘straightway’ recur again and again. There is joy and purpose in these words. There is the sense of astonishment people experienced listening to Jesus. And there is the touch of danger, the revolutionary energy of Jesus, and the plots of his enemies [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus’ Mother Mary And Family | Who Are My Mother And My Brethren? | Neighbours In Christ
Jesus family and friends have worried in earlier verses about Jesus’ sanity. His friends have tried to seize him, to save him from himself. Now his mother and his brothers come to find him. It seems natural to assume they are still very concerned, and that there has been what they perceive to be a breach in the family, which may be linked in some way to Jesus’ move to Capernaum [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Scribes Accuse Jesus | Sin Against The Holy Spirit | Devils, Sin And Blasphemy | Sins Forgiven
As Jesus’ popularity grows, so too do those opposing voices ranged against him. Jesus has worked saving miracles, and now the scribes come from Jerusalem declare that this has not been holy work but rather diabolical. This sounds to modern day listeners to be absurd, although we might wonder at Jesus’ manner as he exorcised demons, and bear in mind that his friends and family thought he had lost his wits and was beside himself. Certainly, the intention of the scribes is to find fault and seize on anything they can to try to vilify Jesus. They are looking to reject the good news and are happy to pervert the truth if they feel by doing so they may harm Jesus [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus’ Friends’ And Relatives’ Concern For Jesus | Christ’s Urgent Mission To Convert | The Word On Fire
There are times elsewhere in the Gospels when Jesus’ enemies accuse him of being possessed by a devil. In today’s very short Gospel reading, we listen to how Jesus’ friends are worried for him, to the point where they wish to save him from himself, thinking that he has gone out of his mind – that he is mad [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Chooses Twelve Apostles | Evangelical Life With Jesus | Ordination And Conversion | Living God
Jesus chooses his core group of disciples, the Apostles, who will live and travel with him and to whom Jesus will impart his deepest and most extensive teachings. While Jesus speaks mysteriously, in parables, to the majority of his listeners, the Apostles will be privy to the hidden meanings of his words, the parables explained, albeit they will often fail to understand or be able to accept what Jesus tells them [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Heals In Galilee | Jesus Of Nazareth | Son Of God | Miracles Of Christ | True God From True God
Mark’s Gospel tells us that, astonishingly quickly, Jesus has become the focus of a vast popular movement. He is preaching in Galilee, and his listeners have come all the way from Judea, from Jerusalem, and from Jordan, Tyre and Sidon. It is an international crowd, and these really are great distances. Jerusalem is over 100 kilometres from Lake Galilee, at its nearest point and as the crow flies. That’s a good few days on foot, and no package tour pilgrimage [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Heals A Man With A Withered Hand | Faith Healing | Prayer And Miracles | The Sabbath
By now, and at such an early stage in Jesus’ ministry, the Jewish religious establishment is coming to fear and to hate Jesus. The Pharisees watch him, like malign, predatory spirits, looking to see fault and ready to pounce on any incriminating evidence. They have already closed their hearts against Jesus. To the Pharisees, Jesus represents a threat – to their own prestige – and an affront to their religious dogmas [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | New Wine In Old Bottles | Fasting | Jewish Custom | Christ The Bridegroom | The New Covenant
In today’s Gospel verses, as yesterday and tomorrow, Jesus finds himself in conflict with some of the Jewish religious leaders. Today, the issue is fasting. It seems Jesus and his disciples are not following received custom [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Heals The Paralytic Man | Faith And Christian Healing | Jesus Forgives Sins
The words of Jesus to the paralytic man on his bed might have seemed strange and even, at first, insensitive: the paralytic has been brought to Jesus seeking to be healed, and Jesus says to him: ‘Son, thy sins be forgiven thee.’ This could hardly be what the paralysed man might have been expecting [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Leper Healed | Christian Faith And The Forgiveness Of Sins | Be Thou Clean | God’s Mercy
As Jesus died on the cross he would have looked like a leper. He had been scourged. Front and back, his skin would have been a bloody mess of welts, cuts and bruises. Being himself without sin, he died in the image of some of those most abject whom he came to save. Truly the self-sacrifice of our Lord was complete and extreme [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Heals The People of Capernaum | Jesus Prays Alone | Faith And Solitude | Communion
Through these verses, we see Jesus healing Simon’s mother in her home, immediately restoring her to wellbeing, so that she is able to serve life. Here Jesus heals in an intimate, domestic environment, within the home. The verses ask us to think of our families and our nearest and dearest ones [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Prayer And Healing | Christ’s Ministry In Galilee | Exorcism | Jesus Heals The Sick And Casts Out Devils | King James Audio Bible KJV
Christ continues his work of healing and exorcism. He passes from the synagogue, a Jewish meeting place for prayer and for reading of the Scriptures, to enter into the home of Simon and Andrew. The Bible tells us that Jesus spends much of his time preaching in synagogues. Later, during his Passion, Jesus will tell Pilate that he has always taught openly in synagogues. There is indeed a great openness to Jesus’ teaching. Many are called, here in a space which would be at the spiritual heart of local Jewish communities. Similarly, we are called as followers of Christ to spread the good news. Our openness with our love of Christ reflects Christ’s openness to the people of Galilee and to us [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Teaches And Heals In The Synagogue Of Capernaum | The Sabbath | Jesus The Son, Holy One Of God, Has Authority | Exorcism Of An Unclean Spirit | Audio KJV
Right at the start of Jesus’ ministry, Mark tells us of the fundamental difference between Jesus and other religious teachers. As we listen to these verses, we are struck by the presence of a Christ who is not, as so many in our modern age like to think, only a fine moral teacher, or a wise man with some fascinating spiritual insights to offer us. When Jesus talks about the Scriptures, when he teaches the people about God, he speaks not as the scribes but with authority, and he has that authority because he knows the Father intimately and he is the Son. As the Son, he doesn’t just explain Scripture; it is his right, he has this authority, to change, to add to, to subtract from, to reinterpret what was already received as the word of God [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | He Taught As One That Had Authority | Jesus As Exorcist | God The Son Rebukes Evil Spirits | The Holy One Of Israel
The Bible offers us different accounts of Christ’s first miracle, each suited to the particular needs of the audiences to whom the Gospel evangelists are speaking. In John’s Gospel, the first miracle is that of the wedding feast at Cana. For Luke, it is Jesus freeing himself when those around him, of Nazareth, seek to kill him. Matthew speaks of the healing of a large number of the sick and possessed, most particularly a leper. Here, Mark tells us of the casting out of a devil. In highly compressed form, we are told of how Christ frees us from the fear of evil. He has power over devils. To a people living in fear, this is a most remarkable and wonderful message [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Fishers Of Men | Jesus Calls His Disciples | Vocation | Brothers In Christ Jesus | Our Salvation
The time is come. Jesus has been baptised by John. He has spent time alone in the wilderness, symbolic of the Exodus wanderings, and is come to Galilee to begin his ministry. His first act is to call the first of the apostles to their new vocation. In Mark’s Gospel, as in Matthew’s, this follows upon the arrest of John the Baptist. This clearly differs from the account of John’s Gospel, while the Gospel of Luke could be seen as presenting a more detailed and less stylised account of the meeting of Christ with the fishermen [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Begins To Preach The Gospel | The First Disciples | Jesus In Galilee | Fishers Of Men | Christian Faith | Vocation | Audio KJV
John the Baptist was sent to prepare the way of Jesus, to call the people to repentance of their sins, such that their souls could be readied to receive the grace of our Lord. He was the precursor, the last of a long line of prophets awaiting Christ. As he baptized, he told the people that one greater than he was to come [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses Advent & Christmas | The Visitation | Christian Faith | Jesus Prayer And Happiness | Blessed Mary, Mother Of God
Mary has expressed complete obedience to the angel Gabriel and to the will of God, declaring herself the handmaid of the Lord. Now she shows her love and compassion for her cousin and friend as she travels with haste to visit Elizabeth, who, she has learnt from Gabriel, is miraculously pregnant, despite her age [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Prayer And Vigilance | Watch For The Son Of Man | End Times | Kingdom Of God | Jesus Is Coming Soon
Most of the signs Christ describes to his listeners in the eschatological discourse had already been realized by the time Luke’s first audience would have heard his Gospel. There had been, and were, wars, persecutions, family conflict, and Jerusalem with the Temple had been destroyed. The Christians of Luke’s time listening to these Gospel verses, of today and since Tuesday, could then have been encouraged to know that they were very close to Christ’s full revelation, his apocalypse, and so have courage to bear persecutions and other great challenges of the early Church [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Lesson Of The Fig Tree | Kingdom Of Heaven | Kingdom Of God | Jesus Christ Is Coming Soon
Just as Jesus’ listeners know how to interpret signs in nature, the trees beginning to bud and shoot new leaves as they come to life in spring, so Jesus tells them that, when they see and experience the upheavals described by Jesus in our Gospel verses of the past few days, they will know that the Kingdom of God is near [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Great Tribulation In Jerusalem | Son Of Man | Apocalypse | Kingdom Of God | Jesus Christ Is Near
The Christians living in Jerusalem wanted no part of the Jewish Rebellion and, remembering Jesus’ prophecy, fled Jerusalem as the Romans advanced. They avoided the slaughter, and for this there arose enmity between Christians and those Jews who adhered to the old Law. There was a parting of the ways. The Jews went to rebuild their religion, led by the Pharisees and along exclusive lines, never more to be centred on Temple worship. The Jewish Christian Church which had been in Jerusalem waned – the Temple had been of great importance to Jerusalem Christians also. Henceforth, the Church would become more and more of the Gentiles [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Persecutions Of Christians | Martyrs For Jesus In The Garden Of Gethsemane | King James Audio Bible | KJV
Jesus teaches us to be bold and to have faith and confidence in the light of persecutions. His listeners are told that, when they are accused, the Spirit will be with them, guiding their words such that they become a living testimony to Jesus. The Christians’ accusers will be unable to answer their words then – the force of their witness will be irresistible [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Eschatological Discourse | Destruction Of The Temple | Kingdom Of Heaven | Kingdom Of God
In Luke’s account of the eschatological discourse, the apocalypse – from the Greek for revelation – is clearly envisaged as beginning in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in AD 70. The natural world is portrayed as being in a state of turmoil, and this reinforces for the listener the impact of what will be – has been by the time of Luke’s writing – a political event. The Jewish rebellion and the sacking of Jerusalem will be brutal and bloody [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Poor Widow’s Mite | Temple Offerings
The poor widow’s offering of two small coins in the Temple is to Jesus the greatest gift of all, because it is offered out of her poverty – it is money she really needed for herself – and with a pure spirit of love and generosity [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | The Passion | Jesus Christ Before Pilate | Christ The King | Kingdom Of God
It is the time of the Passion. Jesus has been arrested and the Jewish leaders have asked Pilate to judge Jesus and order him put to death. Pilate now speaks with Jesus. Jesus’ life is in Pilate’s hands. The lives of all the people in the world are in Jesus’ hands – the crucifixion must happen; the figure of Christ on the cross, which has towered over the Gospels, must be realised, the sign of our redemption and the sign of truth [ .. ]
Daily Bible Verses | Resurrection Of The Dead And The Sadducees
The Sadducees are explicitly held up for criticism in the Gospels less often than the Pharisees, even though they provided the elite which ran the Temple. This is partly because, with the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple in AD 70, the Sadducees were wiped out as a force in Jewish religious life and politics. The Judaism which survived, to regroup and forge a new identity, was that of the Pharisees. Consequently, when there were rivalries between Jews and Christians, it was the Pharisees with whom Christians would find themselves in conflict, and this would colour the memory of earlier times [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Cleanses The Temple | Towards Advent | Jesus Christ Is Love | God Is Love
One thing that emerges here is how understanding of Christ’s meaning develops and matures with time and through recollection. The people have flocked to hear Jesus’ teaching, and in Jerusalem he has a very attentive audience – of ‘all’ the people. Jesus continues, however, to speak in a veiled way, his parables deliberately concealing a part of his meaning, relating to his own divinity, to his accomplishing the inauguration of the Kingdom of God, and the great self-sacrifice to expiate our sins he is called to make [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Weeps Over Jerusalem | That Jesus Wept Meaning He Prayed For The Loss And The Futility | King James Audio Bible KJV
Jesus is so very sorry for a city and a people he loves that he must weep at the sight of Jerusalem. Here is the centre of Jewish faith, while the Jews are the people to whom he has directed most of his teaching, and they are the first chosen people of God [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Conversion Of Zacchaeus | King James Audio Bible KJV | Love Revealed By Jesus Christ
In Jericho, we approach the end of Jesus’ journey. It was in Jericho that the long road of exodus of forty years in the desert ended. For Jesus and his fellow pilgrims, this is the last stage before the ascent to Jerusalem. Jesus’ mission on Earth is soon to be complete [ … ]
Daily Bible Verses | Jesus Healing The Blind Man of Jericho | King James Audio Bible | Miracles Of Jesus
Jesus is very close to Jerusalem now and a great multitude are processing with him. There is a tremendous sense of triumph in the air, even as Jesus approaches the cross, which indeed will be the sign of his victory [ … ]