The more one talks, the greater the likelihood of sinning. The wise man “restrains his lips,” keeping silent and actively listening to others before carefully choosing words of response. Try talking less and listening more today. Ask the Lord to help you hear His voice and to hear the voices of others before uttering a word yourself. Talkers should talk less.
This is the confession of a man who desperately wanted to believe, but still had doubts. This isn’t the greatest of confessions, yet Jesus healed the man’s son nonetheless. Jesus still answers the prayers of those who have a mixture of doubt and belief. The important thing is to confess the doubt, saying, “Jesus, help my unbelief! Increase my faith!” We all begin our journey with Jesus with a “mustard seed” of faith. Following Him, the seed grows into a tree, overshadowing all our doubts, so that only our believing remains.
David described the longing of his soul for God. The brilliant French physicist and philosopher, Pascal, proposed that such a longing was present in every human heart, saying, “There is a God shaped vacuum in the heart of every man which cannot be filled by any created thing, but only by God, the Creator, made known through Jesus” (Blaise Pascal, Pensees). People try to fill this longing with other things, which explains the misery of many. But the human soul can only find its fullest satisfaction in Christ.
The crowds that followed Jesus as He passed through the Decapolis (“Ten Cities”) were “astonished beyond measure” at Him. These cities were founded by Greek colonists and were given favor under Roman rule. The gospel writer Mark tells this story after sharing a previous encounter Jesus had with a Greek woman in Tyre and Sidon who begged Him to free her daughter of a demon. These stories are predictive of how the gospel will go out from Jewish to Gentile lands and be more quickly accepted in the latter. People who have no knowledge of Jesus are still “astonished” when they hear the good news about Him. For He “has done all things well.” This is why we must carry the gospel out to every people group, so that everyone has heard.
Jesus explained that sin begins with an attitude of the heart before it becomes a behavior. Focusing on changing the behavior is unfruitful when only faith in Jesus will change the heart. The human heart is born with an attitude of rebellion against God saying, “My will,” rather than “Your will be done.” This teaching of Jesus also served notice that certain Pharisaical cleanliness laws were human additions to the Mosaic law and therefore not binding. The Pharisees had not lightened the burden of the people, instead they had added to it. Jesus came to change human hearts knowing that no amount of washing our hands would cleanse our hearts.
The heart without love is easily offendable. It looks for offense and strikes back to defend. It leaves a trail of broken relationships in its wake. But the heart of love is hard to offend because it thinks of others ahead of itself. It has no need to defend or protect because love is its strong tower. Where ever the heart of love goes, healing and reconciliation happen. Are you overly sensitive and easily offendable? Ask God to examine your heart.
The Lord gave many types of laws to the Jewish people. These laws might be put in three categories: 1) Moral, 2) Ceremonial and 3) Civil. Moral laws are perpetual, revealing the character of God and showing us how to treat both God and man. Ceremonial laws have to do with the temple worship, holy days, and sacrificial system. Civil laws have the effect of setting the Jews apart as God’s peculiar people. The laws concerning diseases of the skin seem to fall into the last two categories: ceremonial and civil. The “unclean” condition of one with a skin disease makes them ceremonially unacceptable to take part in corporate worship. And it also makes them a danger to the civil community, as their skin condition may be communicable. The specificity of these “cleanliness” laws is astounding considering that medical science didn’t understand the invisible agents called germs until the late 19th century discoveries of Louis Pasteur. The cleaning of items that came into contact with the individual, the burning of clothes and bedding, the quarantine of the individual until the course of the disease is determined, these are all huge advancements for that day.
This with today’s reading in Leviticus 11-12 makes for a revealing juxtaposition. The law details how touching a dead body or a bleeding woman makes one unclean. Mark shows how a touch from the holy Jesus has the reverse affect: The bleeding woman is healed and the dead girl rises again.
The demoniac who lived among the tombs of the Gerasenes must have been a startling welcome as he ran, screaming and crying, down the hill towards Jesus and his disciples as they came ashore. Having just experienced a life-threatening storm on the Galilee and witnessing Jesus command the wind and the waves to be still, I’m sure the disciples’ knees were still shaking as they climbed out of their boat. And then, to be greeted by the hair-raising screams of a wild man running straight at them must have been terrifying! Yet, Jesus responded just as He had to the storm. With the same sense of confident authority He commanded the “legion” of demons out of the man and into the pig herd on the hillside. And just as the wind and waves had obeyed, so did the unclean spirits. The tortured soul of the wild man was suddenly at peace.
Righteous hearts have generous hands. How we handle money and possessions reveals much about our hearts. The righteous not only repay their debts, but give generously to those in need. The wicked avoid even repaying what is owed, much less giving to others. You have received Christ’s generous gift of salvation in your hearts, but has it affected the generosity of your hands?