richcathers.com

New Testament Survey: Matthew - Mark

CCEA School of Discipleship

September 8, 2024

Before Class

Be sure to sign in.

Have each student wear a name tag

A little about me –

I’ve been married for 46 years to Debby Cathers. I have three sons and four grandchildren.

I’m a musician – my Bachelor’s degree at CSUF was in Music

My Master’s degree at Biola/Talbot was in Bible Exposition

I’ve known Pastor Bob since grad school, over 40 years. I used to sit behind him in Church History at Talbot.

I was a youth pastor at Fullerton First Baptist Church for six years

I was an assistant pastor at Calvary Chapel Anaheim for eight years

In 1994, I planted Calvary Chapel of Fullerton, which I pastored for twenty-five years. In 2020 I handed the church to one of my protégés, and in 2022 I stepped away from CC Fullerton to let my team run things without the old man looking over their shoulder.

I currently teach a Greek class to a small online group of young senior pastors. Two are in Oregon and one is in France.

I am very grateful for this opportunity to teach this class.

About the Class

Purpose

This class is aimed at equipping you to read and study the New Testament.

We will look at things like:

We’ll cover background material about each book and point out significant verses.

Before our semester is over, I’m going to ask you to try and memorize one of these verses. For your final I’ll ask you to write out the verse as best as you can, and share very briefly why that verse is special to you.

I also hope to acquaint you with the tool known as Halley’s Bible Handbook. I hope you have each gotten your copy of the book. This was a book that God used to change the ministry of Chuck Smith – encouraging him to learn to take his church through the whole Bible.

My hope is that this class will encourage you to read the entire Bible without fear or confusion. I want you to have a better grasp of how the entire Bible works, how it all fits together.

Textbooks:

Your Bible

Halley’s Bible Handbook (HBH)

Each week I will give you an assignment in Halley’s to help you get acquainted with this excellent tool.

I hope you’ve brought a notebook and something to write and take notes with.

Syllabus

Yes, there’s a syllabus for this course, and I’ll email it out to you all this week now that we’ve got our first week under our belt.

Don’t take it too literally I reserve the right to redirect the class if I think we need to.

Don’t be afraid of my grading – I’m a pushover.

Each week I will email you all my notes after the class.

I will also try to record a video each week of the class and put it on one of my YouTube channels.

There will be a brief one question quiz at the end of each week, but don’t worry, I’ll tell you what the answer is during class.

The final at the end of the trimester is the memory verse that you are going to work on.

Between the Testaments

The last book of the Old Testament to be written is also the last book – Malachi.

Thought to have been written around 400 BC, after Malachi there are no other writings that would be included into the canon of Old Testament Scripture.

“Canon” simply means the agreed/approved list of what is Scripture and what isn’t.

It would be 400 years until the Messiah came.

We call this period between Malachi and the New Testament the “intertestamental period”, the period “between” the two testaments, or the two covenants.

Sometimes you will hear preachers call these the “silent” years.

But don’t think that God wasn’t working or that God wasn’t at work in the nation of Israel.

It was during this time that the Jews took a couple of steps forward that would get them ready for Messiah.

The Jews established rabbinical schools – the training of rabbis.

There were two main schools – one in Jerusalem, and the other in Babylon.

Though many Jews returned from Babylon to Jerusalem after Cyrus proclaimed their freedom, the majority had stayed in Babylon.

Some of us preachers like to say they stayed in Babylon out of rebellion, but that doesn’t mean that God wasn’t working in Babylon.

There was a strain of rabbis that believed in the work of the Holy Spirit. They taught the scriptures. They even performed miracles (think of the “sons” casting out demons – Mat. 12:27)

While the first wave of immigrants from Babylon settled in the southern area of Judea, with its capital of Jerusalem, when the next big batch of immigration began around 100 BC, there wasn’t as much room in the south and they decided to settle in the north, in the Galilee area, and it was here that the charismatic rabbis settled.

Jesus would have grown up among these rabbis from Babylon.

I’m not trying to say that Jesus learned all He knew from these rabbis, but to point out that Jesus grew up in Galilee, and Jesus would have been familiar these men.

In a way, these rabbis helped prepare people for the supernatural ministry of the Messiah (though they still rejected the Messiah).

Matthew

Author

The Gospel of Matthew was written by … Matthew.

Matthew was one of the twelve disciples/apostles.

Compared to Simon Peter, we don’t know too much about Matthew.

The name “Matthew” means “gift of Yahweh”.

We know his father’s name was “Alphaeus” (which means “changing”).

He is mentioned by the name “Matthew” five times in the New Testament.

(Mat. 9:9; 10:3; Mark 3:18; Luke 6:15; Acts 1:13)

He is also called “Levi” four times in the New Testament, and he is called that before he meets Jesus.

(Mark 2:14,15; Luke 5:27,29)

But both Mark and Luke start calling him “Matthew” after he starts following Jesus.

The one thing we know for sure about Matthew was that before following Jesus, he was a “tax-collector”.

That meant that he, as a Jewish man, was working for the occupying Roman government to collect taxes from his fellow Jews.

The tax collectors were given specific amounts they were to collect from each person, but they were not limited to collecting the minimum from people.

They were given the authority to collect as much as they wanted, and they could keep whatever was over and above the Roman minimum.

Illustration

The local bar was so sure that its bartender was the strongest man around that they offered a standing $1000 bet: The bartender would squeeze a lemon until all the juice ran into a glass, and hand the lemon to a patron. Anyone who could squeeze one more drop of juice out would win the money. Many people had tried over time (professional wrestlers, longshoremen, etc.), but nobody could do it. One day this scrawny little man came in, wearing thick glasses and a polyester suit, and said in a tiny, squeaky voice, “I’d like to try the bet.” After the laughter had died down, the bartender agreed, grabbed a lemon, and squeezed away. Then he handed the dried, wrinkled remains of the rind to the little man. But the crowd’s laughter turned to total silence as the man clenched his fist around the lemon and SIX drops fell into the glass. As the crowd cheered, the bartender paid the $1000, and asked the little man, “What do you do for a living? Are you a lumberjack, a weightlifter, or what?” The man replied, “I work for the IRS.”

We might think of tax-collectors in terms of our modern IRS agents, but perhaps if we lived under Russian occupation and our taxes went to Moscow.

Tax collectors were hated by their fellow Jews and considered as traitors.

The word “tax collector” itself is often found paired with the word “sinners”.

Even Jesus, when using the word for “tax collector”, used it in a derogatory way (notice who records this…)

(Matthew 5:46 NKJV) For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?

Here’s a clip from the TV series “The Chosen”, from season 1, episode 7.

Video: The Chosen 1.7 – Jesus calls Matthew

Jesus chose to hang out with “tax collectors”.

Matthew himself records what happened after Jesus called Matthew to follow Him. Jesus had dinner at Matthew’s house. (see also Luke 5:27-32)

(Matthew 9:10–13 NKJV) —10 Now it happened, as Jesus sat at the table in the house, that behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat down with Him and His disciples. 11 And when the Pharisees saw it, they said to His disciples, “Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” 12 When Jesus heard that, He said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. 13 But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice.’ For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.”

Remember, this is Matthew writing about his own experience of Jesus eating dinner at his house.

Lesson

Jesus loves sinners

I imagine it’s possible that one or two of you might struggle with the idea that Jesus might love you.

You’ve done things that you are ashamed of.

You might think that if you were to meet Jesus on the street, He’d probably cross to the other side to avoid you.

You think you’re the last person God would let into heaven.

I’ve got news for you.

You are just the person Jesus came for.

(John 3:16 NKJV) For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.

That includes you friend.

Jesus is a friend of sinners.

He came to save you. He came to forgive you. He came to get you back on the right path.

Open your heart to Jesus.

Lesson

Strange Bedfellows

One last thing to think about with Matthew. Jesus not only called a Jew who was considered a political traitor, He also called Simon the Zealot, who was a radical, almost terrorist, who believed in doing everything to overthrow the Romans, including killing all traitors.

Can you imagine what that looked like around the campfire once they all began to get to know each other?

It would be like a church filled with people who had been Republicans … AND Democrats.

Jesus calls all kinds of people to follow Him, and we as fellow believers need to recognize that not all believers look and think like we do when the meet Jesus.

But when we have Jesus, we have all we need to learn to connect with each other.

Paul wrote,

(Colossians 3:12–14 NLT) —12 Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. 13 Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. 14 Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony.

Audience

As much as we can, we will try to identify who each book is written to – who the intended audience is.

That can be important to understanding each book.

There is a strong Jewish flavor to the Gospel of Matthew

There is a tradition that Matthew wrote originally in Hebrew or Aramaic.

Yet what we have is written in Greek.

Some have tried to do a reverse translation from Greek back into Aramaic, which is interesting.

Yet we have no ancient manuscripts of the book of Matthew in Aramaic, only in Greek.

Date of writing / fitting onto timeline

I don’t think the specific date of the writings of these first three gospels is all that important other than to know they were written in the first century, when people were around who also witnessed these events. They were all most likely written before the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70.

I’d agree with Mr. Halley and date Matthew around AD 60.

The idea of building timelines will become much more interesting when we see how the epistles fit into the timeline of the book of Acts.

Major historical events

Of course this book is about the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Matthew will also mention Herod the Great, Herod Antipas, and Pontius Pilate, all secular historical figures.

Geography

Except for Joseph and Mary’s brief excursion into Egypt, the gospels all focus on places within the land of Israel.

If you ever have a chance to visit Israel – go. Your understanding of the Bible texts will grow tremendously as you start to see how the whole land is laid out.

Genre

Understanding books of the Bible is tied with understanding what kind of literature each book is.

The Bible has books that are poetry, prophecy, and history.

There are poetic books like the Psalms.

There are prophetic books like Isaiah or Zechariah.

There are historical books like Genesis and 1Samuel.

We will see that the “epistles” are letters written from one person to another, or to a group of people.

The four Gospels are historical books.

They are not metaphorical, as if we should try and find a symbolical meaning for each word.

They are actual, literal, historical accounts of the life of Jesus.

Theme

Over the years I’ve heard various teachings that try to differentiate the gospels from one another.

Some have said that the four living creatures in Revelation 4 represent the four gospels, and then try to tell us that one of the gospels is like the lion, another like the calf, another like a man, and the last as an eagle.

I’m afraid I think those comparisons are a bit forced.

I think the best “theme” I’ve seen for Matthew is simply,

“Jesus is the Messiah”

And this is a “theme” that could probably fit the other three gospels as well.

The book of Matthew as a “gospel”

These first four books of the New Testament are called “the gospels”

The word “gospel” simply means “good news”.

Often we use the word “gospel” to be answer to the question, “How can I be saved?”

Do you understand the basics of how a person is saved?

They need to recognize they are a sinner.

They need to understand that Jesus died to pay for their sins.

They need to turn from their sins and open their hearts to receive Jesus.

But the term “gospel” also refers to these four New Testament books that tell us the good news that God’s Kingdom has come to earth through the person and work of Jesus.

The work that Jesus came to accomplish involved His death as a payment for our sins.

All four of the books tell us about this.

The first three gospels are called the “synoptic” gospels.

The word “synoptic” means that these books give us a similar view of the life of Jesus. (“with” + “see”)

In contrast, John wrote his gospel much later than the other writers, and his goal was to fill in the blanks of what the other gospels did not cover. That’s why John’s gospel contains so much content not found in the other gospels.

This is why John’s gospel is not considered a “synoptic” gospel. It’s just different from the others. Same Jesus, different material.

On the other hand, Matthew, Mark, and Luke all contain much overlapping material, but each is seen through different sets of eyes.

Of the three synoptic gospels, Matthew is the only one written by a direct eyewitness of Jesus’ ministry.

Even though all four gospels are quite heavily Jewish in their background, Matthew has always seemed to me just a bit more Jewish, if that makes sense. Matthew is clearly writing to a Jewish audience.

His book is filled with Old Testament quotations. There are about 50 direct quotes from the Old Testament, and an additional 75 “allusions” to Old Testament events.

In our Old Testament Survey class, we tried to point out some of the links between the Old Testament books and their fulfillment in the New Testament.

You’ll see lots of this in Matthew. For example …

(Matthew 3:1–3 NASB 2020) —1 Now in those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the wilderness of Judea, saying, 2 “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” 3 For this is the one referred to by Isaiah the prophet when he said, “The voice of one Calling Out in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, Make His paths straight!’ ”

Does your Bible text look a little different in the last half of verse 3? Get to know how your Bible handles these quotes from the Old Testament. Some are in all caps (like NASB), some are in italics, some just have a footnote.

If you glance over the next couple of pages in Matthew you should see lots of places where Matthew is quoting the Old Testament.

Turn to…

Matthew 1:1-17 Genealogy of Jesus

To a Jewish mind, genealogies are important because they connect us with our past, our heritage.

When you come across genealogies in the Bible, don’t skip them. Learn to speak the names out loud. See how many of them you can remember and identify.

Matthew is going to connect Abraham to David and then … eventually to Jesus.

Abraham is the father of the nation, the father of “faith”. God promised Abraham…

(Genesis 22:18 NKJV) In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice.”

This blessing was a promise of the Messiah, a blessing for all nations.

David was the beginning of a kingdom dynasty. God promised David…

(1 Chronicles 17:11 NKJV) And it shall be, when your days are fulfilled, when you must go to be with your fathers, that I will set up your seed after you, who will be of your sons; and I will establish his kingdom.

Jesus is the ultimate fulfillment of David’s promise.

Note: This genealogy is the line of Joseph, Jesus’ earthly father.

This is the “legal” connection between Jesus and King David. Joseph was not the biological father of Jesus, but he was the legal father of Jesus.

Matthew is careful to include the complete line of kings from David to Jesus, showing Jesus’ legal claim to the throne of David.

There is another genealogy of Jesus in Luke 3 – and it’s a bit different. We believe the genealogy in Luke is that of Mary, or more specifically to Mary’s dad, and not Joseph and so shows the actual biological line of Jesus all the way back to Adam. Luke’s genealogy shows Jesus’ connection to all mankind.

The Luke genealogy shows that Jesus is not only the legal heir of the throne of David, but the biological heir as well.

We might think of genealogies as being exact records of one descendant to the next, but that’s not Matthew’s priority, and that’s not how all Jewish genealogies work.

Matthew’s going to skip a few folks here and there, but don’t worry about that. He’s got reasons (you’ll get it in a minute).

Look at Matthew 1:1

(Matthew 1:1 NASB 2020) The record of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham:

The genealogy will actually divide into three parts.

Abraham to David

David to the captivity

The captivity to Jesus

As you work your way through the names, you’ll notice a few things:

Jesus came from a messy family.

The story of Judah and Tamar is quite messy.

The story of David and Bathsheba is super messy.

There are women (gasp!) mentioned – and they all have a story.

Some of their stories are again quite messy.

(Matthew 1:10 NASB 2020) Hezekiah fathered Manasseh…

Matthew records some of the kingly descendants of David, including Manasseh, the most wickedest king of all.

Yet he’s an ancestor of Jesus.

Lesson

God uses flawed people

(This is the “answer” on the quiz – write it down)

There are plenty of “skeletons” in Jesus’ genealogy

We might think that we should hide some of those skeletons…

Illustration

The Joneses were proud of their family tradition. Their ancestors had come to America on the Mayflower. They had included Senators and Wall Street wizards. They decided to compile a family history, a legacy for their children and grandchildren. They hired a fine author. Only one problem arose—how to handle that great-uncle George, who was executed in the electric chair. The author said he could handle the story tactfully. The book was published. It said “Great-uncle George occupied a chair of applied electronics at an important government institution, was attached to his position by the strongest of ties, and his death came as a great shock.”

Matthew doesn’t hide the skeletons in Jesus’ closet.

We have this strange idea buried deep inside of us that thinks that good things only happen to good people, and bad things only happen to bad people.

When we encounter difficulty in life, we ask ourselves, “What did I do to deserve this?”

When something good happens, we might pat ourselves on the back and think, “I deserved this!” (or, we might say, “What did I do to deserve this???”)

If this notion were true, Jesus wouldn’t have any skeletons in His closet.

But He did.

When the prophet Job encountered his own difficulties, losing his family, his possessions, and his health, we read some forty chapters of his friends trying to discover what sort of sin he committed to deserve the bad things.

Yet we are told in the very beginning of the book of Job that God considered Job a “blameless” man.

God didn’t allow difficulty in Job’s life as a penalty – God was showing the heavens what a righteous man will do when he’s facing difficulty. A righteous man will still trust God (and Job did).

You may be feeling that you’ve done something that has disqualified you from God ever using you.

I’m here to tell you that the God who used this extremely flawed line of people to produce the Messiah, can redeem you from your background.

God forgives. God restores. God equips. God uses.

Paul wrote to the Philippians,

(Philippians 1:6 NKJV) being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ;

Look at…

(Matthew 1:12 NASB 2020) After the deportation to Babylon: Jeconiah fathered Shealtiel, and Shealtiel fathered Zerubbabel.

In 586 BC, the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the kingdom of Judah, leveled the city of Jerusalem.

The majority of the Jews were carried off to Babylon, including the line of Jesus.

The genealogy will then take us through Babylon until we get to Jesus’ step-father Joseph.

Matthew’s genealogy establishes the “legal” end of Jesus’ claim to be the king of Israel because Joseph was a descendant of King David. (remember the census that drove Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem? Why Bethlehem? It was the “city of David”, Joseph’s ancestor). (Luke’s genealogy establishes the biological link to Jesus)

(Matthew 1:17 NASB 2020) So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; from David to the deportation to Babylon, fourteen generations; and from the deportation to Babylon to the Messiah, fourteen generations.

If you were to compare Matthew’s genealogy with others in the Bible, you will notice that he’s left out some names here and there. But it’s almost like he’s done it on purpose in order to come to this division into three groups of fourteen.

This is a Jewish thing. An eastern mindset thing.

Matthew was trying to get to the “numbers”

Jews are very aware of numbers and one of the most important numbers is 7, the number of perfection. It’s a “God number”

There’s more to this genealogy than meets our western eyes… (this is from Ray Vander Laan)

The number of words in Jesus’ genealogy is evenly divisible by 7, a very clear “God number”. Keep in mind, we’re talking about ALL words in the genealogy, not just the names. This is based on the Greek, not the English…

The number of words that begin with a vowel is evenly divisible by 7.

The number of words beginning with a consonant is evenly divisible by 7.

The number of letters is evenly divisible by 7.

The number of vowels is evenly divisible by 7.

The number of consonants is evenly divisible by 7.

The number of words that occur more than once is evenly divisible by 7

The number of words that occur only once is evenly divisible by 7.

The number of nouns is evenly divisible by 7.

The number of non-nouns evenly divisible by 7.

The number of proper names evenly divisible by 7 male names and female names (keep in mind some generations have more than one name listed)

The number of words beginning with each letter of the alphabet is evenly divisible by 7.

If you add up the numeric value of all the letters because they don't have numbers it's evenly divisible by 7.

Now maybe Matthew was some kind of genius, but I’d say it’s more likely that this was all inspired by the Holy Spirit.

Could you write a paragraph that covers real historical facts, but also would come up with these kinds of results?

Jesus is from God and this book we are looking at is pretty special.

One more lesson from Matthew…

Lesson

Detours can be important

It was four hundred years that God was “quiet” after the Babylonian captivity, after the prophet Malachi.

Does that period of time sound familiar?

Abraham (the beginning of the genealogy) was promised that his descendants (Gen. 15) would spend 400 years in Egypt before being brought into the promised land.

Four hundred years can lead to …

A Promised Land.

A Messiah.

Each of us goes through times where we feel we’ve gotten “off track”, or that things didn’t go the way we planned (I’ve been on a detour for the last six months with my health).

God can use these times to speak to us, mold us, and get us ready for what’s up ahead.

I believe God spoke through Isaiah to talk about Israel’s “detour” in Babylon:

(Isaiah 43:2 NASB 2020) “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; And through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, Nor will the flame burn you.

When God allowed the nation of Israel to return from Babylon, only a small fraction went back.

Us pastors like to lay out guilt trips, and we will often say that it was only the truly faithful that went back.

Yet God was also at work in those who stayed in Babylon.

They got rid of their idolatry and sought after Yahweh.

They developed synagogues, the precursor to the church.

They established rabbinical schools which trained Bible teachers.

They developed a theology of the Holy Spirit and miracles.

Much of this foundation was then transferred to the Galilee region where Jesus grew up and started His ministry.

Jesus showed them what God had been preparing them for.

Detours can be important.

Significant verse(s)

As far as the rest of the content in Matthew, you will find that all the gospels follow a semi-chronological format.

Some will deal with Jesus’ birth. Others start with His baptism.

Then Jesus’ 3 ½ year ministry

All will spend significant time on the final week of Jesus’ life, His death, and resurrection.

Let’s look at something towards the end of Matthew

Jesus spent the final week before the cross in Jerusalem, teaching daily in the Temple.

(Matthew 22:34–40 NASB 2020) —34 But when the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. 35 And one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him: 36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” 37 And He said to him, “ ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the great and foremost commandment. 39 The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 Upon these two commandments hang the whole Law and the Prophets.”

I used to think that Jesus was giving some new brilliant statement saying that love sums up the Ten Commandments, until I found out about the rabbinical schools in Jesus’ day.

The Pharisee rabbis were divided into two groups, following after two different Pharisee teachers.

The Question: What is the greatest commandment?

You could tell which group a rabbi was associated with by asking them, “What is the greatest commandment?”

The Jews had over 600 commandments in the Law of Moses. Sometimes these laws came into conflict with one another. The Jews understood that there was this built in tension – so they worked at developing a hierarchy of laws – which law was more important than another if they should come into conflict.

If you had a donkey that fell into a pit on Shabbath (the Sabbath), do you rescue the donkey and break the law of not working on the Sabbath, or do you leave it there until Sunday?

The Pharisees were divided into two groups – the house of “Hillel” and the house of “Shammai”. You will see hints of this in the TV series The Chosen.

Hillel was a scholar who was born in Babylon (60BC), and died in Jerusalem (AD10)

Shammai lived a little later. When Hillel died, Shammai took over the leadership of Sanhedrin. He died in AD30. We think he was alive during Jesus’ ministry.

Both Hillel and Shammai agreed that loving God was the greatest commandment. No one disagreed on that.

The second greatest commandment was where there was tension.

The house of Hillel felt that loving your neighbor was the second greatest and that it summarized the second half of the ten commandments (all related to people).

The house of Shammai felt that keeping the Sabbath was the second greatest commandment since it was all about honoring God.

When you read the gospels, you will see this tension, especially regarding the Sabbath.

You will find that Jesus’ idea of “loving your neighbor” wasn’t new, He’s letting the people know that He agreed with Hillel on the matter.

Mark

Author

His Jewish name was John (Acts 12:12) (Ioannes in Greek, Yehohanan in Hebrew, “Yahweh is gracious”), he is sometimes referred to as “John Mark”. (“Mark”, Marcus, is a Roman/Latin name meaning “defense”)

(Acts 12:12 NASB 2020) And when he realized this, he went to the house of Mary, the mother of John, who was also called Mark, where many were gathered together and were praying.

(Acts 12:25 NASB 2020) And Barnabas and Saul returned when they had fulfilled their mission to Jerusalem, taking along with them John, who was also called Mark.

(Acts 12:25 NASB 2020) And Barnabas and Saul returned when they had fulfilled their mission to Jerusalem, taking along with them John, who was also called Mark.

Mark was NOT one of the twelve apostles.

We think that Mark has included a brief mention of himself as the young man in the Garden of Gethsemane:

(Mark 14:51–52 NASB 2020) —51 A young man was following Him, wearing nothing but a linen sheet over his naked body; and they seized him. 52 But he pulled free of the linen sheet and escaped naked.

His mother was the sister of Barnabas’ mother (Col. 4:10), making him Barnabas’ cousin.

You will see Mark pop his head up in the book of Acts when Barnabas brings him on one of the missionary journeys (Acts 13:5)

There’s a bit of a story in Mark’s life that you can trace between the lines of Scripture.

He was a “quitter”, and yet God was able to work in his life where he became useful again.

More on Mark:

His mother’s name was Mary (Acts 12:12), and the early church often met at her house. It was at this house that the church was praying for Peter while he was in prison and it was at this house that Peter went after he was miraculously released from prison.

When Paul and Barnabas began their first missionary journey, he went with them as a helper (Acts 13:5). But when things started to get tough, Mark abandoned them when they got to a place called Pamphylia and he apparently returned to Antioch (Acts 15:38)

When Paul and Barnabas were going to start their second missionary journey, they had a huge argument over whether or not to take Mark with them. Paul didn’t think Mark was very trustworthy, but Barnabas wanted to take Mark. Paul and Barnabas ended up parting ways with Barnabas taking Mark with him to Cyprus (Acts 15:39).

At some point, Mark was reconciled with Paul, and Paul even asked Timothy to bring Mark with him to Rome because Paul saw that Mark had grown up and had become a faithful man (2Tim. 4:11).

(2 Timothy 4:11 NASB 2020) Only Luke is with me. Take along Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful to me for service.

Here’s another example of God using “flawed” people

God can take people who have failed before and help them become usable again.

Be careful about giving up on people who have disappointed you.

Tradition has it that Mark then went to Alexandria, where he started a church. He died as a martyr in AD 64 in the eighth year of the reign of Caesar Nero.

Date of writing

At some point Mark will spend time with the apostle Peter in Rome.

Mark is called by early church historians Peter’s “interpreter” while in Rome.

It is thought that the gospel of Mark was pretty much the account of Jesus’ life as told by Peter and was likely the earliest gospel written.

Tradition has it that Mark wrote his gospel between AD 56-63 while at Rome with Peter.

Miscellaneous

Mark is the shortest of the gospels – only 16 chapters.

A silly thing – just about every verse starts with the Greek word “kai” (the most common conjunction, “and”), 1,091 times. You may not see that reflected in your English translations, but it’s there.

I remember a teacher in seminary saying that this gave us an idea that Mark may not have been the smoothest of writers when it came to the Greek language. Or else he flunked his high school English classes.

Significant verse(s)

If this is really the story of Jesus through Peter’s eyes, then next time you read through Mark, look for Peter.

He’s often the one speaking up, whether it’s being the one saying “You are the Christ” (Mark 8:29) or rebuking Jesus for thinking about going to the cross (Mark 8:32).

When Jesus takes Peter, James, and John up to a mountain to pray and they are met by Moses and Elijah, it’s Peter who says, “Hey, let’s build three tabernacles” for you all because … he didn’t know what else to say (Mark 9:6)

When Jesus said the disciples were going to fall away when He got arrested, Peter said he would never deny Jesus (Mark 14:29)

Jesus took Peter, James, and John with Him into the Garden of Gethsemane to pray. Yet the disciples fell asleep…

(Mark 14:37–38 NASB 2020) —37 And He came and found them sleeping, and said to Peter, “Simon, are you asleep? Could you not keep watch for one hour? 38 Keep watching and praying, so that you will not come into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

Matthew records Jesus speaking to Peter (Mat. 26:40), but it’s Mark that records Jesus calling Peter by his birth name “Simon”.

Luke doesn’t mention the “rebuke” and John skips Jesus praying in Gethsemane.

It’s Mark that has the personal touch (“Simon”)

Of course you know that Peter will deny Jesus, and Mark records every detail of Peter’s great failure.

Yet after Jesus rises from the dead and appears to the women, Jesus says …

(Mark 16:7 NASB 2020) But go, tell His disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see Him, just as He told you.’ ”

Jesus wasn’t finished with Peter. You can read more about Peter’s encounter with Jesus in Galilee in John 21.

Quiz

What kind of people does God use?

1. He only uses perfect people

2. God uses flawed people

3. God only uses angels

Homework

Read “Henry H. Halley – A Memoir” (at the back of HBH);

Read these sections in HBH: “Was Jesus the Son of God?”, “What Was Jesus Like?”, “The Twelve Disciples” (about 11 pages in Deluxe Edition)

(I’ll send you this in tomorrow’s email)

Next Week:

We will be looking at Luke and John