Advent 2025: Tue 23 Dec
Mark 3.7-12 O Sabbath-rest by Galilee?
7 Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the lake, and a large crowd from Galilee followed. 8 When they heard all he was doing, many people came to him from Judea, Jerusalem, Idumea, and the regions across the Jordan and around Tyre and Sidon. 9 Because of the crowd he told his disciples to have a small boat ready for him, to keep the people from crowding him. 10 For he had healed many, so that those with diseases were pushing forward to touch him. 11 Whenever the impure spirits saw him, they fell down before him and cried out, ‘You are the Son of God.’ 12 But he gave them strict orders not to tell others about him.
Jesus was mainly at work out in the open, where crowds of people were able to come and hear him teach and preach and to witness healings and miracles. What a contrast to airless synagogues and the joyless accusations of the Pharisees!
Imagine the scene. Firstly, Jesus may not have been ready for the crowds. He may have been hoping for a rest – no chance of that. Some came from as far away as Jerusalem (have you ever tried walking or donkeying from London to Ipswich?!).
So many are pushing to get close or touch him that he gets into a boat so that he can minister from the lake – will they all hear him? Possibly not, but perhaps people knew how to listen better than they do today! Or did it matter if they couldn’t quite hear what he was saying? It’d be a long journey back home for some of them, and they’d pick up what Jesus had said from their travelling companions and hear about the miracles and healings they might not have seen. Imagine Jesus healing someone brought to him. I don’t see him staying in the boat for that. He wouldn’t have a stage to work from, so there’d be a throng around every person who was brought to him. Those in the crowd would not have seen much.
But they were there!
Even with stadium numbers of people present and many witnesses on hand Jesus is still ordering those people from whom he’d cast out impure spirits not to spread the story of what had happened to them. It would seem a bit strange to people if someone known in their locality to be possessed in some way just turned up “normal” and was cagey about saying what had happened to them. My only thoughts on this would be that Jesus did not want people’s attentions drawn to the Enemy. Jesus himself did not make a big noise about Satan – he preferred to point us to Father God and his Kingdom.
How far have you travelled to experience Jesus?
Has there been an occasion, an event, when you felt you “were there!”?
Is Satan defeated?
Father God, I want to see you at work through your Holy Spirit in the lives of people in teaching, preaching, healing and cleansing. I want to see the name of Jesus lifted high in my neighbourhood, and over this nation. I submit myself to be used for your glory. Amen.
We sing hymns of expectation of the arrival of the Messiah to remind us of Father God’s promise. Take the words of this Advent hymn to heart, challenging yourself to live in the fulfilment of that promise.
Paul