Bible Survey - Mark
Vern Peterman · Aug 17, 2014
Bible Survey, No. 32
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926437121592

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

We've been going through the books of the Bible in a survey fashion, and last week Randy covered Matthew for us, and we have today the Gospel of Mark. One of the things I want to take a look at is just, you know, why four Gospels? Why not just have one? And one of the things you see here is the Gospels were written to different audiences. So you have in the chart on the top of page one there, Matthew was written to a Jewish audience. How could we tell that Matthew was written to a Jewish audience? What are the indicators? Fulfillment of prophecy is one of the indicators.

Anything else? Ah, genealogies. Now, one thing is that the genealogies matter a lot to the Jews, but not so much to the Greek and Roman mind. Not as much to the Greek and Roman mind. So, yes, the genealogies. Any other indicators that say that Matthew is a Jewish-oriented book.

One of the things in chapter 10, Jesus sends out the disciples two by two. He says, go only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. The Sermon on the Mount is actually very Jewish in its orientation. In Matthew 15, when Jesus is approached by a Gentile woman, He says, I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

So here we are in Mark, and we say that it's directed to the Romans. And one of the things I want to take a look at, see those bullets down in the middle of the page? These are some of the indicators that it was directed to primarily a Gentile and specifically Roman audience. So some of the evidences include, between the four Gospels, the word immediately occurs 80 times. Half of those, 40, are in the shortest gospel, Mark. And why that?

The Romans were not so much interested in all the Jewish issues, and the Greeks were the ones who liked to sit there and talk philosophy and that sort of thing. Among the Romans, they wanted to get things done. And so what you see is in the gospel of Mark, Jesus is presented as the one who gets things done. He's the one who focuses on accomplishments. The next bullet down, you see the Gospel of Mark makes significant points about the centurion in charge of Jesus' crucifixion, both right after Jesus died and when Joseph of Arimathea requested Christ's body.

And then the next one, the third bullet, Mark does not contain genealogies. That's a point that was made here. The Sermon on the Mount, which is distinctly Jewish, is not included. And it places less emphasis on the Jewish sects. We have the Pharisees and the Sadducees and the other different groups. These are things that would have mattered to the Jews but not to the Romans.

And then finally here we have Mark also interprets Aramaic words. Several times when we give references there, where the Aramaic words come out, he says, this means this, which the Romans wouldn't have known automatically. The other uses a number of Latin terms in place of the Greek equivalents. So these are all indicators. There are more, but those are significant indicators that it was written to a Roman mindset. Romans basically have the Roman Empire and Israel was kind of often the far end of the Roman Empire.

And so he's directing by his selection of words, by explaining Aramaic terms, by using Latin terms. He's explaining the life of Christ to a Roman mindset. What they would understand, what they would consider important. Now, were there Jews in Rome? Yes, but he's not primarily aiming at those. Matthew's got a book directed to the Jews. And we're also going to be taking a look at Luke, which was written to the Hellenists.

Now, we think, Hellenists? What's a Hellenist? A Hellenist is somebody who is of Greek language and cultural background, but not ethnically from Greek, the Greek background. So for example the Jews who were steeped in Greek culture and language were Hellenists.

And then finally you have the Greek world is the Gospel of John and we'll be taking a look at that a couple Sundays from now. Alright so here's John Mark who's the author of the Gospel of Mark, was the son of Mary and it's interesting we don't know anything about the father A woman of wealth and position in Jerusalem. And Barnabas was his cousin. Anybody remember Barnabas' nickname? What's that? Son of Encouragement? Yes. And there's actually a connection here we're going to make. John Mark was a close friend of Peter.

So here's 1 Peter 5.13. And John Mark's abandonment on Barnabas and Paul's first missionary journey was a point of contention between Barnabas and Paul, just before Paul was getting ready for his second missionary journey. Remember that?

That's out of the book of Acts, chapter 15. So here's Barnabas and Paul, and they're getting ready to go on this next missionary journey, and big contention. They end up splitting the two of them up. and Paul takes off without Barnabas. He takes Silas instead, and on the way going through the churches of Galatia, they pick up Timothy.

So you end up having a big split, but there's a kind of an untold story here, because why was the contention there over John Mark? How did that happen? Why would Paul object to taking John Mark? The first trip, he got part way through and went home. And one of the things you see is the son of Mary, but you don't see the father in the place. He's a mama's boy.

But, so what does Barnabas do Barnabas takes him under wing, takes him back home, because Barnabas is from Cyprus, takes him back home, spends time with him, and after that, John Mark is a changed man. So that he is a friend of Peter, and what we see later on in here, Paul, who at first, I'm not going on a missionary trip with that guy, Paul eventually says, send John Mark because he's useful.

So Barnabas carried on a restorative ministry with John Mark. And by the way, that wasn't the first time that Barnabas stood up for somebody who had a bad reputation. Because previously he'd stood up for Paul, named Saul. So this Barnabas is quite a guy. It's a really neat guy. And I think the tension between Barnabas and Paul would not have had to have taken place if both Barnabas and Paul had recognized Barnabas has got a different kind of ministry. Barnabas has got a different kind of ministry, you know?

It sort of reminds us that God uses circumstances that seem negative at the time to accomplish things. The persecution in Jerusalem and the famine caused the gospel to spread throughout the Mediterranean world. If things had been going well, they probably would just have had the big church there in Jerusalem. And I think that's a very important point.

In other words, what we read is here's this tension between Paul and Barnabas, and in fact God's going to use the fact that Barnabas spends time with John Mark to turn the situation around and ending up with John Mark being somebody that Paul asks for, that is a friend of Peter, that ends up writing one of the Gospels.

He's not an apostle. But he ended up having an association with both Peter and Paul, and at first Paul said, I don't want anything to do with this guy, on his second missionary journey, and later on says, please send him, he's useful. His life was turned around. He was a different kind of man. Okay, let's take a look here, second page. Here's Mark at a glance.

And so what we have, Mark is the shortest of the four Gospels. And what are some reasons why Mark would be the shortest? Can you think of reasons why Mark would be the shortest? he's writing to a Roman audience, all of the Jewish details no longer have significance. Yeah, so you wouldn't put a lot of Jewish detail in it, so that wouldn't be there. Good.

Is there any other reason? What you said before, the Romans were into What's the story? What's the bottom line? Yeah, they wanted accomplishment. So you didn't have a lot of trips through the rose garden there and rabbit trails. Yeah, long orations, they were not particularly interested in. And so it's, you know, Jesus is the one who gets it done. That's what they were interested in hearing about. And so all the long, you know, Sermon on the Mount and things like that, just completely stripped out or cut way back.

So that would explain why Mark is the shortest of the four Gospels. One of the things that you'll see both in this Mark at a Glance and down below is Jesus is portrayed as a servant. A servant who gets things done. So we have in the Mark at a Glance material there, the presentation of the servant, that's kind of the introduction of Christ as a servant, the opposition to the servant, and then finally instruction by the servant, 8 through 10, and then rejection of the servant, and the resurrection of the servant, right at the very end. What's interesting is the Gospel of Mark presents the resurrection but doesn't have a lot of description of a bunch of resurrection appearances. Those show up in the other Gospels.

Another thing that you look under the Mark at a Glance, look on the topic and look at the period of time. You have three years for about half the book. And then the last half of the book focuses on the six months and especially the eight days up to the point of Christ's resurrection. So that's another thing that stands out with Mark, is that he goes quickly through a few years and then focuses, and it's kind of like it's a zoom lens, zooming in on those last months and especially those last days in his account. Okay, let's take a look. You've got four pages at the rear here that have color printouts. And one of the things you'll have there, Mark is among those that lists the twelve disciples or apostles. What are some of the things that you notice about Mark's listing? Mark, like Matthew and Luke, lists Peter as Simon. Why would Peter be called Peter and Simon? Was Peter his first name and Simon his last name?

Why is that? Jesus changed his name. Ah, okay. Jesus gave him a different name, right? And one of the things you'll find in scripture as a long-standing pattern is people being given two names. Can you think of some examples in the Bible where people are given two different names? Pardon? Abraham is called Abraham, right? Okay, so there's one and you think of another Pardon Right and and and Sarah as well. Okay, and who else you think of another? Pardon Jacob. Yes.

So here's here's Jacob and what's his other name? Israel So what you see is it's actually a very long-standing cultural pattern to be given two names. How about, not listed here, but how about the Apostle Paul? What was he first called? Saul. So you actually see that as a fairly long-standing pattern. People given names later on. Yes, Stan? Ah, interesting. Yeah. Yeah. And we will be given a new name. Isn't that interesting?

The name is meant a lot, just like the genealogy of what you call your children. You think of going through the prophets, particularly the mighty prophets, of God saying, call your children by this name. And the angel announcing to Mary that you shall call this name Jesus. Which wasn't a traditional name. Same thing happened with John the Baptist. He was not named according to tradition.

So yeah, names are significant and double names are common. And that's also one of the other patterns you see here when you look at some of these names here. You end up with some of them are consistent, but some of the others it's like, wait a minute, this person has another name. One of the things we see also is identifications can be different.

Here's Simon the Canaanite, which by the way is not the same as being a Canaanite. Simon the Zealot is how he's otherwise identified. At any rate, so here are the lists of the twelve disciples or apostles. What's very interesting is that some of the disciples are not mentioned, actually a number of the disciples are not mentioned again in the Bible after this listing in Acts chapter 1. And by the way, Mary is also not mentioned by name in the rest of the New Testament after Acts chapter 1. Mark is one of those who gives a list. John does not give a list of the various disciples and he also is disinclined to talk about himself.

Let's take a look at the flip side of that. What you have is a Passion Week map, and that's particularly relevant for Mark in that he spends a lot of his gospel, he spends a lot of it on this Passion Week, this last week. And so Jesus spent all of the last week of his life before the crucifixion in and around Jerusalem. So he basically stayed in or close to Jerusalem during that last week. Why would he have stayed close to Jerusalem during that last week? In or close to Jerusalem during that last week?

Pardon? Yeah, it was Passover and that is the kind of the primary, the premier Jewish feast And it starts with Passover as the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. So it was traditional to stick around during that week. And so it was amazing during that week that Christ would become our Passover. During Passover week. Well, yes.

Essentially, technically, Passover is just one day, the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. However, because of the Feast of Unleavened Bread following, people, the Jews would call it the Days of Passover. They would also call it the Feast of Unleavened Bread and include Passover within that so that the names were interchangeable. So were they two separate things then? Technically, they were separate things. In other words, think about it.

What started Passover? What began that with the Jews? It's the one event they're supposed to get ready and actually eat standing up, eat the whole thing, and get ready because the next day you're leaving Egypt. And so that initiated Passover. The days following was the Feast of Unleavened Bread, and Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread were given out of the Law of Moses. It's like the Passover was the signal. Yes, to start it.

It's sort of like when you're saved, you're saved as an individual. You work out your salvation over time. And so the feast of unleavened bread, because they didn't have time to prepare the bread in the usual way. So it commemorates and it sticks in your mind more if you're being raised as a child. If you have more than just the Passover meal, you've got this whole connection to your history that is repeated over a number of days and it sticks with you more.

As we studied in John, the brothers of Jesus tried to get him to go up to Passover because they knew that there was a lot of pressure against him and he said he wasn't going to go yet so he went up a little bit later and so that also says according to John that he was there to be a teacher and to be in the presence of the Pharisees and the other rulers because of what was going to happen.

So it's kind of like pouring salt into a wound. He was going to be there, he was going to teach, he was going to be in the temple. In fact, didn't he do the cleaning the temple? Cleansing the temple during that week. Think about how this would have been for Jesus. Here he's in Jericho. was Zacchaeus, Zacchaeus the chief tax collector and then he goes to Bethany for after the death he waited after the death of Lazarus he could have prevented Lazarus death but he didn't so he waited until after the death of Lazarus and then goes to Bethany He deliberately gets there late.

And then he goes into Jerusalem for all these events that we see marked out on the map. Okay, let's take a look at, you've got another one called the Crucifixion Clock here. And we presented that before. Here I mark out Mark out no pun intended some things from the gospel of Mark It was the third hour when they crucified him now.

What is the third hour mean? Yeah, you notice that the the the way that they mark time is is zero hours about 6 a.m. And then the third hour is about 9 a.m. Right 6 hour would have been about noon. So that's the way they would count out time. But let's ask, do they have any watches like this? No. So it's an estimation of time that's approximate. And I think that's important to keep in mind.

Nonetheless, so what you have here is this crucifixion clock that shows things in sequence, not necessarily by some precise counting of time, because they just didn't have that. So what you see the first thing is the third hour of the day when they crucified him. So the sentence had been pronounced by Pilate and they crucified him. Think about this, who crucified Jesus? The Romans carried it out and the way it would have been done is they would have just standard Roman soldiers carrying out the crucifixion under the direction of a centurion.

Ordinarily the centurion, why does he get called a centurion? Yeah, in other words, he would technically be in charge of about 100 people. They actually varied that number over the time of the Roman Empire. So probably more like about 80 during this time. So what they would do is he would be the one in charge of 100 people, approximately 100 guys in battle. But in this time, they'd say, okay, how many guys do we need to have on duty? for this crucifixion. And that would be what they would carry out. So they had this centurion in charge of it.

And then what you see at the top of this clock, at the sixth hour, darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour. The ninth hour would have been about three o'clock. What you see as a pattern is Jesus, from nine o'clock till noon, is actually conversing with people. When one is crucified, and I've not been crucified, but when one is crucified, doing too much of that's a little tough. But, he's talking to people. What are some of the conversations that he's carrying on during the morning hours?

Yeah? One thing, take care of his mother. Yeah, in other words, he takes care of his mother, and how does he do that? He says that she's supposed to live with John. Okay, so he directs her and John and says you're in charge. Why would he do that? He respects John and he knows that Mary is going to take care of him. Okay. Apparently, I mean the last time we see Joseph, right? The last time we see Joseph is when Jesus is about 12 years old. And he disappears from the scene. So Jesus as the eldest son would be one who would take care of his mother, right?

That would be his responsibility, but that's about to end. You fulfilled the law. One of the parts of the law is to honor your father. That's right. Honor your father and mother, even if your father's not in the picture anymore. Right? So, he, even on the cross, took care of that detail. I'm not going to be around, so John, that's your job. Right? So, then what happens from noon? Oh, we're not done here.

What are other conversations that take place on the cross? He says he's thirsty. Yeah, later on he says he's thirsty. But what are some conversations, significant conversations that take place? He has a conversation with one of the others being crucified. Early on, the picture we get is that the two thieves are both railing at Jesus. But by noontime, The picture changes. One of them says, remember me when you come in your kingdom. And Jesus says, today you'll be with me in paradise.

So another hugely significant conversation. And then, during the afternoon hours, he does say a few things, but they don't have to do with conversations with people. not in the same way. He does say, as you pointed out, that he's thirsty. That's John 19, 28. He also says, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Which he apparently said in Aramaic, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?

And that is a quote from Psalm 22. And they also says, as recorded in John, it is finished. which is, it's one word in the Greek, it's in the perfect tense, completed past action, ongoing results, and it is an accounting term. He says one word, and it's an accounting term, and he says it's all paid. It's all paid.

Father, into your hands I commit my spirit. Let's ask this question, did Jesus go to hell when he died? Isn't that in the Apostles' Creed? It is in some versions of the Apostles' Creed, but it's a multiple translation issue. It's translating one language to another to another, and eventually it says, you know, he descended into hell. If he says, today you'll be with me in paradise, Father, into your hands I commit my spirit, did he go to hell? No. No, he did not. Pardon? Yeah, nor purgatory. Didn't go to hell, didn't go to purgatory. Both those things are errors.

Okay, so finally Jesus dies and you have these words from the Gospel of Mark. So those are up in the inset on the upper right. Mark 15, And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last, when the centurion who was standing right in front of him saw the way he breathed his last, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God.

It is very interesting that all the centurions in the New Testament are spoken well of, including this one. All of them. All of them in the Gospels, all of them in the Book of Acts. All the centurions are spoken well of, and this one included. And why would Mark, writing to the Romans, make sure that this got recorded and reported?

Back again, a centurion has a higher position. He's got respect. Yes. If you say a centurion says something, it carries more weight than if you said... Yes, and that's key. In other words, if you're writing to Romans, you want to have what is said be something that they're going to respect. And so let's quote a centurion.

Here's a guy who's well regarded and looked upon favorably and so Mark makes a point to quote what the centurion said so then Joseph of Arimathea came a prominent member of the council who himself was waiting for the kingdom of God and he gathered up courage and went before Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Pilate wondered if he was dead by this time and summoning the centurion so here's the centurion again get the centurion's input He questioned him as to whether he was already dead, and ascertaining from the centurion, he granted the body to Joseph.

Okay, you've got another page here, the flip side of that crucifixion clock. This is the resurrection of Christ. This is a summary of the passages and what we've done is to make note of those that are from the Gospel of Mark here with bold and blue print. But putting together all the resurrection appearances, you really have quite a significant bit of evidence for the resurrection. Let's take a look at the first one, Mark 16, verse 1.

So the tomb is visited by the women, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome. One of the things I think is God's humor. Because the Jews had determined that women were not reliable witnesses. So what does God do? He makes sure that the first witnesses to the resurrection are women. Right? And so that's recorded in Mark and in Matthew.

So Mary Magdalene, which by the way, that's not her last name, Magdalene. She is from Magdala, which is a town on the very western part of the Sea of Galilee, along the coast. The synagogue of Magdala was fairly recently excavated by archaeologists. So she was Mary of Magdala, is another way to put it. That's where she was from. Joseph of Arimathea. Arimathea was a village, not too far away from Jerusalem. And so Joseph of Arimathea, he's from that village. Mary is from Magdala.

That's why she gets called Mary Magdalene. We have different customs. When somebody is from a certain place, we've got different customs as to how we say that person is of that ethnicity or from that location. And so we have customs like that, and that's simply, that's what this is. The custom that someone from Magdala was called a Magdalene. Jesus was called a Nazarene.

Yes, yeah, good point. And so what we have is just a pattern of here's how we describe where somebody's from or what their background is. I'm sorry, I just think it would be bizarre to refer to people that way in our modern culture. Yes, here's Vern the Californian.

Sometimes this gets lost, I just make that point because it's not her last name, she's just from Magdala. and Mary the mother of James and Salome. One of the things you wrestle with in the New Testament is that by New Testament times, one in every five women was named Mary. So trying to keep those straight, that's one of the reasons for the pattern that you see, you know, Mary the mother of this one, Mary the one from here, you know, some kind of differentiation.

Okay, now the next one that Mark records The tomb found empty by the women at about the time of sunrise. So here is another visit to the empty tomb. Then what you find is Mark 16, 9 through 11. These are the post-resurrection appearances. So first you have four different recordings of the empty tomb. four different recordings of the empty tomb. Then you begin on Sunday the resurrection appearances. And who first sees Jesus resurrected?

Mary, which one? Magdalene. Mary from Magdala, right? And again, this is kind of a mocking, if you will, of the Jewish tradition that women were not reliable witnesses, right? Now, it was actually later attributed that she was a woman of ill repute, but actually the Bible itself doesn't say so. Yeah, okay. Yes.

I was just going to say that, you know, the story that they put out that somebody else took him out of the tomb and that he supposedly appeared to all these people, but that doesn't take into consideration. He was just on the cross. beaten to a pulp and he was crucified. And even if they would have taken the body out of the tomb, there's no way he could have made any of these appearances. So these would have had to have all been lies. And a lot of these appearances were to groups. They witnessed to one another the fact that they saw him. A lot of the appearances were to groups of people.

And even, here's Sunday, Jesus appears to how many disciples Well, but on this Sunday, how many does he appear to? He appears to 10 men. Who's not there? Thomas. And wouldn't you know it, Jesus waits a week, a week to appear to Thomas. Isn't that amazing? We also have, as Stan was saying, a picture of somebody who, if he were alive, would be in a hospital ICU unit. He's on the road to Emmaus with two disciples, talking about how the Old Testament points. prophecy to the Messiah in the boheman hood.

All kinds of things that just wouldn't match up. This is one reason why there are multiple instances of people starting off writing something that disses, if you will, on the resurrection and end up becoming believers. That has happened multiple times. It happened to one skeptic in the 1700s. It happened to other skeptics during the 1800s. It has happened to multiple people in the last century, including C.S. Lewis. Clive Staples Lewis.

So you have evidence so strong that even those who approach it with skepticism are turned around, including Thomas. Here's Thomas, his fellow disciples, ten of them, are all saying, we have seen him, he is resurrected, and Thomas doesn't believe them for a week. And I'm sure they're saying, Thomas, we've seen him, we've all seen him. Nope. Great skepticism. Great skepticism.

But Thomas himself, a week later, isn't it interesting that the Lord waited a week? Thomas himself a week later comes and appears Jesus comes and appears before Thomas. Which also, I think Thomas is a great witness to the truth of Jesus' miracles. Because a man of that nature, died in the will of a skeptic, would have never stayed as a disciple of Jesus if he would have seen these miracles and not believed them.

I mean, he would have left with so many other people. Thomas is the best example of the truth of Jesus' ministry. the fact that he stayed with him and the fact that later he died a terrible death testifying to the truth of the gospel the two brothers James and John sons of Zebedee the two brothers are bookends to the lives of the apostles James is the first one to die and that death is recorded in Acts chapter 12 John is the last one to die, and he's the only one who dies a natural death. What we have recorded of all the other disciples is that they died for their faith. Sometimes we have varying reliability to the account, but with the exception of John, they all died for their faith. It is recorded that Matthew was in North Africa and he was yelling out the gospel while they were driving wooden stakes through his body. These men testified to their death of the resurrection of Christ. The evidence is potent. The evidence is potent.

So here we have in the Gospel of Mark continued testimonier Mark 16, 12 and 13 talks about the two disciples traveling to Emmaus who didn't believe the report about the empty tomb. That's the brief account in Mark. Ten disciples revealing characteristics of Jesus' resurrected body. This is the ten because Thomas was not there. And then the eleven in Galilee Then to 500 is recorded by the Apostle Paul. A great commission to large numbers of followers. So Mark is a part of this pattern of reporting of resurrection events.

By the time you put it all together, the evidence is massive for Christ's resurrection. We have it to summarize at the bottom of the page there. To summarize, there were several recorded testimonies to the empty tomb, including multiple instances of simultaneous witnesses, at least 11 recorded instances of witnessing Christ's resurrected body in the 40 days after the resurrection, with witnesses numbering from 1 to over 500, and 3 witnesses to Christ's resurrection after His ascension. To these we add the persistent public testimonies to the resurrection, often spoken among other witnesses in the very same locality, and the personal testimony of Peter in writing, who saw the empty tomb right after Christ was resurrected, and saw and spoke to him in his resurrected body multiple times up to the day of Christ's ascension. And he was willing to die for it. Who are the people who see Christ after his ascension?

Paul, Stephen, and one other. Peter, James, John and the Transfiguration. Well, that's not the Transfiguration, but after his ascension. There's one more. Pardon? Paul is one. We mentioned that. So to Stephen, to Saul, later called Paul, and then we have at the bottom of the table there, and to John. This is the book of Revelation. Can you imagine? Here's John. He's seen Christ resurrected. And now, a half century later, approximately, he is seeing Christ resurrected again. and he writes about that. That's what we see described in Revelation chapter 1.

Paul, did Paul go to paradise before he died? Yes he did. Paul talks, he writes to the Corinthians and said that he went to the third heaven and he went to paradise but he says I can't write about it. John, on the other hand, sees Christ resurrected and actually has 150 verses approximately on the heavenly scene and is told that he must write about it. Isn't that interesting? So Paul's been there, but told he can't write about it. Can't say a word. So he's been there and can't talk about it. John goes there and is told he must write about it.

Well, again, back to who the message was addressed to. Paul was witnessing this good news that there was a sin problem that we had and that it had been dealt with through the life and work of Christ. And if you start talking about resurrection from the dead and other things which would detract, in a way, from that original message. You want to lay the foundation first before you get involved in building the structure and the details. And so Paul's message was a basic message, you might say.

In John, the gospel is being spread and people do pre-affirmation, as it were. Here is the Apostle Paul writing about our heavenly position and set your mind on things above and we have a heavenly citizenship, right? So he's talking about that, but he's forbidden to describe it. John does not write about our heavenly position, but he is told to describe what he sees. It is amazing to me as you look at the various disciples, they did not have an equal assignment. They were given very specific things to write about. and told, you know, you can't write about this and you have to write about that. And it's, this is coordinated from heaven. This is not just something that happened historically. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Amazing. Yeah.

Okay, let's pray. Lord, we thank you for your word. We thank you for this very special Gospel of Mark. We just thank you as we continue our survey of these Bible books. You have deliberately had written some very potent testimony and some very powerful words. And we ask that you would use those words to change our hearts from the inside out. And we just thank you for this time of study, briefly serving over the Gospel of Mark. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.