Second Quarter
2005
Adult Sabbath School Lessons:
Jesus Through the Eyes of Mark
Insights
to Lesson 4
By Galilee
April 16-22
(Produced
by the Editorial Board of the 1888 Message Study Committee)
"He Spake in
Parables"
This
week’s lesson is about several parables that illustrate God’s kingdom
and power. Two were simply word pictures, while the others were living
parables. There’s so much depth in this lesson that we can’t begin to
cover it all in this short Insights.
Throughout
the Gospels we find that Jesus’ parables are generally grouped into three
sessions which reflect the increasing opposition of the church leadership to
His teaching. As He neared the end of His time here on earth, the lessons
became more pointed as Jesus attempted to bring corporate repentance to His
people. His lesson was clear: without a true heart conversion and deep
repentance for their sin of unbelief, they would not be ready for the
outpouring of the early rain He longed to bestow upon them.
We
can imagine that a common exclamation from the groups of people gathered
around to hear Jesus was "never a man taught us like this," which
revealed both perplexity and skepticism over what they were hearing in His
teaching. The amazement or astonishment of the people witnessing His many
miracles indicates not just wonderment about the miracles and demonstrations
of power, but also indicates a rising alarm which set the stage for
theological controversies.
Jesus’
teaching, both in theological terms and in parables, was not as the scribes
and Pharisees taught. Jesus taught "with authority." His material
was new, not like the rabbinical parables which were mere rehashes of their
private interpretations of Scripture. The scribes and Pharisees liberally
sprinkled their parables with quotes from their favorite rabbi, which was
intended to provide their sayings with an impression of authority based in
tradition.
The
scribes and Pharisees usually began their parables with "to what is the
thing like?" and then proceeded to use an illustration that would place
the meaning of the Law within the range of comprehension of the common
people. Rabbinical parables usually concluded with an exhortation to take
much greater pains in studying the Law while attempting to live a righteous
life to merit favor with God.
However,
Jesus’ use of parables was refreshingly different, bringing precious fresh
bread from heaven to feed the starving people. They were intended by Jesus
to set forth, not the merit of study or working for righteousness, but the
compassion of the Saviour who was seeking the lost sinner, reconciling him
to his heavenly Father. In His parables, Jesus used familiar references to
well-known scenes or events from daily life, that was in accordance to
prevailing notions. Most of His parables were simple, yet complex, having a
depth of meaning that would reward the student who contemplated its profound
significance.
Two
of the parables in this week’s lesson deal with the kingdom of God, and
the other four are living illustrations of God’s power over His creation.
I refer to these miracles as parables because they have been left to us
through the written word as object lessons regarding Jesus’ power to save
from sin. If this Man has power to still the furious squall that had come
upon the sea, and power to cast out thousands of demons with a single word,
and raise the dead to life, then surely He has power to deliver us from our
sin!
Through
His miracle/parables, Jesus proved that He was going to have ultimate
victory over Satan. No matter how much control Satan appears to have over
individuals suffering under terribly vexing circumstances, the power of the
word of God is stronger. Jesus is Lord and Master of the animate and
inanimate world.
The
new light on the character of God that was being shed upon the people was
viewed with skepticism, especially by the leaders of the Jewish people.
Certain illnesses were understood by them to be a curse from God for some
horrific sin that had been committed (e.g. leprosy). Mental illness was
demon possession that even their elaborate exorcism techniques could rarely
cure.
Yet
here was a Man who ignored all the priestly regulations, not only
associating with the sick and feeble, but actually touching the unclean
(leper, bleeding woman, dead girl — all of these would have made Jesus
ceremonially unclean). With a word He was able to staunch bleeding, raise
the dead, cast out demons, still the raging storm. Incredible; unbelievable!
Seeking to protect themselves from this new revelation, the scribes and
Pharisees claimed that only Satan himself could have such power.
You have the
example of the Jews how they treated everything that did not harmonize
with their opinions of doctrines. They settled the matter that they had
the truth on every subject and could be instructed in no point, and in
the place of producing reasons from the Old Testament to show that
Christ and His disciples were in error, they would not hear Him and
condemned him, and misstated His positions and His doctrines, treated
Him as a criminal and guilty of grievous wrongs. (1888 Materials p.
463).
In
the adult teacher’s Quarterly lesson outline we find these comments:
"False interpretations of religious teaching in Jesus’ time caused
many to have misplaced faith or to lose their faith entirely. . . .We must
be discerning in how we apply our deeply held beliefs and practices."
"False
interpretations of religious teaching" have always led people astray.
We see a time closer to us when the same thing was repeated among our own
brethren. New light on the covenants and living a righteous life through
faith alone in the merits of the Saviour was sent to us from God in 1888.
Because of preconceived opinions, truth was rejected and kept away from the
world.
When the Jews
took the first step in the rejection of Christ, they took a dangerous
step. When afterward evidence accumulated that Jesus of Nazareth was the
Messiah, they were too proud to acknowledge that they had erred. So with
the people of our day who reject the truth. . . . Just like the Jews,
they [certain brethren at the Minneapolis general conference] take it
for granted they have all the truth, and feel a sort of contempt for
anyone who should suppose they had more correct ideas than themselves of
what is truth. (1888 Materials, pp. 169-170).
Working
to shut off the light that exposed their false concepts, the Pharisees
increased their opposition to Jesus as He progressively revealed God as a
merciful and loving Saviour who came seeking the lost sheep, willing and
able to "save to the uttermost" all who would believe in His
power. Continued resistence eventually caused them to commit the worst crime
in the history of the universe—the crucifixion of their only source of
redemption from sin. We find history repeated in our own behaviour at
Minneapolis in 1888.
An
unwillingness to yield up preconceived opinions, and to accept this
truth [on the covenants], lay at the foundation of a large share of the
opposition manifested at Minneapolis against the Lord's message through
Brethren [E.J.] Waggoner and [A.T.] Jones. By exciting that opposition
Satan succeeded in shutting away from our people, in a great measure,
the special power of the Holy Spirit that God longed to impart to them.
The enemy prevented them from obtaining that efficiency which might have
been theirs in carrying the truth to the world, as the apostles
proclaimed it after the day of Pentecost. The light that is to lighten
the whole earth with its glory was resisted, and by the action of our
own brethren has been in a great degree kept away from the world. (Selected
Messages, Bk. 1, pp. 234-235).
"There
is no new thing under the sun" and so we see that we’re still in the
same unbelieving condition as were the Pharisees and scribes of Jesus’
day, sadly in need of a true heart conversion and corporate repentance that
will prepare us to receive the latter rain He so longs to bestow upon His
people.
As
we study these lessons from Mark, let us learn to accept—as a little
child, as a helpless cripple, as a leper without hope, as one lost at sea
during a hurricane—the awesome power being revealed to us to save us from
sin. What Jesus did then, He is more than able to accomplish now. If we will
yield our selves to the power of Christ, we will find freedom from all our
sins. We have been set free (past tense). The prison house is open, let us
walk forth in newness of life in Christ. It’s past time for us believe
this good news and proclaim that gospel which "is the power of God unto
salvation to everyone that believeth" (Rom. 1:16).
Other
Gospel points to consider as you develop your study of this lesson:
-
By associating
with sinners, curing their illnesses, touching the unclean, Jesus was
taking our sins upon Himself (Isa. 53:4-9, Heb. 2:17; 1 Pet. 2:24). This
demonstrates the truth of the human nature which Christ assumed in the
incarnation. He is not far off from us, but a Saviour nigh at hand; our
Kinsman Redeemer (Lev. 25:48,49; Ruth 2:20).
-
The storm was
an attempt by Satan to destroy Jesus. The Old Testament uses symbolic
illustrations of Satan as leviathan (dragon), a huge monster from the
deep (Psa. 74:14; Isa. 27:1). Jesus has power over Satan, to crush his
head. Satan is a defeated foe; sin no longer has dominion over us (Rom.
6:12-14).
-
Jesus has
power to call those things that aren’t as though they were. His
creative power gave life to the dead and dying, cured the leper, cast
out demons. It is what calls us righteous, and not only calls us
righteous, but makes us righteous (see SC p. 62). A.T. Jones, Lessons
on Faith, p. 46—"When God speaks, there is in His word the
creative energy to produce the thing which that word pronounces."
E.J. Waggoner, Christ and His Righteousness—"It is true
that God will by no means clear the guilty; He could not do that and
still be a just God. But He does something far better: He removes the
guilt, so that the one formerly guilty does not need to be cleared,—he
is justified, and counted as though he never had sinned." (p. 72).
-
There is no
salvation in depending upon our own power. Just as the disciples sought
to save themselves from the power of the storm and forgot their true
Saviour was right there in the ship with them, so we are reluctant to
place our entire dependence upon Him (DA 334-336). Living faith in His
power is what saves us. "Since faith is the depending upon the word
of God only, for what that word says, being justified by faith is simply
being accounted righteous by depending upon the word only. And since the
word is the word of God, dependence upon the word only is dependence
upon God only, in the word. Justification by faith, then, is
justification—being accounted righteous by dependence upon God only,
and upon Him only because He has promised." (A.T. Jones, Lessons
on Faith, p. 25).
—Ann Walper
Read the study notes for Lesson
5
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