PRAY LIKE JESUS
Read
Mark 1:32-39
Development
As we can appreciate, the Apostle Mark tells us the urgency of the ministry of Jesus, in which Jesus healed the sick, cast out demons, taught the word, among other things.
The people of that time as at present lived surrounded by the things of the world and therefore not very good things happened to them as at present.
In fact we can find several examples (Mark 1:29-31) of the healing of Simon's mother-in-law. Where later we can see that Jesus healed many and cast out many demons,
In the historical context we see that people waited until night, when the Sabbath had officially ended to bring those who were sick or demon-possessed in front of Jesus for him to heal them, and we can also appreciate that Jesus did not allow demons to speak to him, and that those who received the blessing of being healed did not allow them to know him (Mark 31; 1:25; 3:12; 1:44; 5:43; 7:36; 8:26) he even forbade his disciples (Mark 8:30; 9:9). Mark presents us with this small paradox since throughout the entire New Testament there are 6 cases where Jesus performed exorcisms, (Mark 1:23-28;
Matthew 8:28-32; Mark 7:24-30; Mark 9:14-27; Matthew 9:32-34; Matthew 12:32) si pay attention in the bible there are more than 200 verses where Jesus performed (exorcisms, healings, resurrections, and miracles with nature) . Turn this into a larger story than the passion of Christ itself and virtually all of this is part of half the gospel, and yet these actions are accompanied by a command of silence, and in the second part of the gospel there is a small part in because Jesus believed that if this was disclosed he would benefit, then? Why would he order to keep silence? Let's look at it in light of the scriptures. People came to Jesus to be healed, not saved. They only saw Jesus as a magical healer They did not see him as the son of God. If we think a little, we can realize that the healing that Jesus gives us is secondary to the salvation that he has for us as the son of God, now in my human thought, I believe that Jesus commanded silence beyond what God acted on people through his son, Jesus told them to be quiet because this distracts people from their main mission. What is it? Well you know the answer, I would like to see it in the WhatsApp group.
Continuing…..
Jesus did not seek the honor of the demons, for this reason he did not let them speak, because as the scriptures show, they called him the prince of demons, Jesus himself was told such a barbarity, can you believe it? (Mark 3:22) therefore if Jesus allowed the demons to speak to him or identify themselves, it would give credibility to the accusations that were raised against him (Mark 3:22-30)
The demons understood who Jesus was, because they knew they are also spiritual beings, the identity of Jesus for many was not very clear, even for his own disciples, it was not like that until his death and resurrection. (Mark 8:33) where even Peter himself could not understand. Leaving aside two exceptional witnesses who are mentioned in the bible,
The first or rather the first to recognize him as a superior being and worthy of worship was the woman who, if you remember, anointed Jesus' feet with perfume (Mark 14:1-11).
And the second was the centurion on the cross (Mark 15:39).
Outside of these two exceptional witnesses, Jesus did not allow himself to be defined by those who did not truly understand him.
If people were to identify Jesus as the messiah, it would bring many sociopolitical consequences for the time, in case the ministry of Jesus caused a stir among the religious leaders of the time.
Since the Jewish people expect the complete opposite of what Jesus was, they expected a strong leader capable of organizing armies to fight against the Romans and thus expel them from Israel, recovering the pride that that nation had had under the government of King David, but unfortunately for the Jews of the time, the vision of Jesus was totally opposite to what they expected.
Besides, all these things represented a potential distraction from his true mission. What is it? Send it by WhatsApp.
Jesus models his ministry on the model of the servant (Isaiah 49:1-6) where God acts through cover-up and concealment
And don't misunderstand this last part. Here I want to say that God does not act as he did in the old testament that on many occasions God intervened directly with his creation, No, on the contrary God now does not intervene directly with humanity but uses people to achieve his ends.
Jesus withdrew to a deserted place and prayed (Mark 1:35)
Many will believe that Jesus, at the end of his day, surely ended up exhausted with so much walking, healing, exorcising, teaching, etc.
Well, the truth is that Jesus was the son of God, but he had a human body, with necessity, Jesus suffered thirst, hunger, heat, cold like any of us, but the scripture teaches us that very early before he left the sun, withdrew to a deserted place and there, prayed to the heavenly father (Here we can appreciate an example of the concealment of the father) regardless of this there are also several scenes in the bible that we must highlight regarding the desert, which we will surely talk about later, but that of John when he calls people to repentance in the desert and we have the 40 days of Jesus in the desert, where he was tempted by satan and won.
In my humble opinion, I think that when he mentions the desert as a place to pray, he is referring to a place where Jesus could give himself unreservedly in communication with the heavenly Father, because let's remember that Capernaum is a city in the desert, it is surrounded of deserts, but we look a little deeper we can notice that the desert is a super important place, remember what happened to the Israelites when they left Egypt, Jehovah redeemed them in the desert, so the desert is not how one pinches it Rather, it is a place of atonement, where one can focus on communication with God, well brothers these deserts are currently our problems for us and our solution is in prayer, hence one of the great premises of talking with the father .
We can do the same in the privacy of our hearts, in our rooms as Jesus taught us, (Matthew 6:6) let us always remember that God is like every father, he wants his children to tell him all their problems, fears, doubts, he always He is there to listen to us, and like every father who loves his children, he will never leave us alone.
An interesting aspect that is not said but that is implicit in the book of Mark is that Mark does not call the apostles apostles, he does call them by their names, Mark does not recognize them as disciples, first of all let's define what means the word Disciple.
The dictionary gives two definitions:
1 - Person who receives teachings from a teacher or who continues studies in a school.
2 - Person who follows and defends the ideas, doctrines and methods of a teacher.
What interests us is the second definition, now well knowing what disciple means, because you believe that Mark did not recognize his own companions as disciples, well the question is simple, the disciples were not fulfilling the functions of disciples , which is learning and then doing.
And of this we have several examples in the Bible, in the verse of (Mark 1:35-36) we have an example:
35 - Getting up very early in the morning, while it was still very dark, he went out and went to a deserted place, and there he prayed.
36 - And Simon sought him, and those who were with him;
37 - and finding him, they said to him: Everyone is looking for you
Let us remember that Jesus got up very early in the morning to go and pray to the father, and of course logically the disciples went out after him, and waited for him as mentioned elsewhere, but apparently this time many people followed him, and the disciples did not they were able to entertain the crowd until Jesus returns, but not what they did, they searched for him, found him and interrupted his communication with the heavenly father,
We have another example of this when Jesus goes to Gethsemane, and separates himself to pray, taking with him Peter, John and James. He withdrew to pray, and when he returned he found them sleeping, this happened three times in the same night. (Matthew 26:36-46) Based on this, Mark does not call the disciples disciples as I mentioned before, but calls them by their names, since they were not doing the tasks of a disciple.
Another aspect to highlight from this visit to Capernaum is that no matter how many miracles Jesus performed, the people of that city regarded him as just another sorcerer, and they continued to call him a magician or sorcerer. And we have the evidence in the scriptures for how the people of Capernaum behaved, who only cared about healing and not salvation, even Jesus puts them less than the inhabitants of Sodom (Mark 11:23; Luke 10:15 ) Another aspect to highlight is that Jesus in his ministry had little existence in his hometown of Nazarea, his hometown, and in Capernaum, his adult city.
One aspect that we must not forget are the activities that Jesus carried out, a city on the go, a city in which he did not stop praying, preaching and exorcising (Mark 1:39) and do not forget that all this went hand in hand with the ministry of Jesus.
Today's churches are very fragmented in terms of their mission, and sometimes we find some questions like the ones I will mention now. Are we preachers or healers? Should we emphasize evangelism or charity? Should we focus on the healing of the body or the healing of the soul?
An effective ministry does not pick one of these things, but deals with all of them just as Jesus did.
Read
Hebrew 5:7-10
Development
In the days of his life as a mortal being, Jesus offered prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death and was heard thanks to his reverent submission to his infinite will.
Regardless of the fact that he is the son of God, through suffering he learned to obey the will of the father, and consummated his perfection he became the author of eternal salvation for those who believe in him and obey him, even God himself named him. high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.
Additional Information:
"The Melchizedek Priesthood, which is 'after the Order of the Son of God', has the right to preside, and has power and authority over all offices in the church." It also has an obligation to maintain the spiritual integrity of all members of the church. It is named after a great high priest who lived during the time of the Patriarch Abraham.
In the book of (Matthew 26:39) we can find Jesus asking. My Father, if it is possible, pass this cup from me; but not as I want but as you, as we can see, this was a critical moment for Jesus, a moment in which he was completely surrendered before God, and he put his entire life at the disposal of his will above his own that is obedience and obedience is always rewarded.
For this reason, God appointed Jesus as high priest and in him eternal salvation was founded for all who recognize and obey him.
A point to highlight regarding the request that Jesus made to God: My Father, if it is possible, pass this cup from me; but not as I want but as you. He was not asking him to free him from all the bodily suffering that was about to go through and contrary to what everyone believes, he was not even asking him to free him from death, Jesus from the beginning of the I knew for a long time that all this was going to happen and I accept it, I accept the will of the father. What Jesus asked him is that God not depart from him, (Matthew 27:46). The explanation is simple, God withdrew from Jesus because it was necessary, let's remember that in previous classes we said that Jesus was turned into Sin but NOT into a Sinner, and as it is well known where sin is, God cannot be.
That separation of the father from the son was only for an instant, the instant of his death, but imagine what that meant to Jesus. Accustomed to being with his father since the beginning of time and having to separate from him. But still I accept it.
Now if we transpose much of what we read from the book of Hebrews to the present, what it is describing to us is the daily struggle of a person who really loves the Lord, if you read correctly.
All those who claim to love the Lord and do not completely surrender to him, the Bible tells us that they do not belong to him.
The book of Hebrews is describing us as Christians, that we must have our entire lives at the disposal and service of the Lord and his will.
That is why all those who claim to love God, and who do not surrender to his will, since they are truly not of God, but all those who know what walking in our steps represented to us and who now do not want to take a single step without being sure that it is his will, we pray day after night without ceasing just as Jesus did, we pray to the father, we open our hearts and express our fears, we express to him all those that motivate us and above all we end up telling the father to be his will and not ours, because we are convinced that their plans are better than ours. And many often wonder, what about my reward? My award? Well, that is life worth and the joy that only Jesus Christ can give us.
Logically, not because everything is resolved and the problems are over, everything is going to turn rosy, it is not clear that Jesus Christ was crucified and that is why everything was a utopia. In fact, even in these modern times, where societies have matured, we Christians continue to suffer persecution and stigmatization, beyond being our fullness and our peace to come with the knowledge that we are doing the will of God,
Fulfillment does not come when you earn more money, when your problems are solved, when you find a partner or anything else, in this world there are thousands of people who lose loved ones, fathers, mothers, sons, daughters and yet they remain firm in the Word of God, the lost relative cannot return to us, the reality is as King David said, he does not come to me, but I go to him. And the peace that David manifested was founded in Jehovah, not in that loved one who has left. Can you understand the depth of this? Meanwhile, where are you? As followers of Christ we cannot be living double lives, even though the path of the Lord is a path of constant struggle where we fall and get up again and again and again.
We humans are far from perfect, our hearts and minds are set on the goal, to follow in the footsteps of Jesus, denying ourselves so that he grows day by day in our being, prayer after prayer, clinging to his word and trusting in his promises, not letting a moment pass apart from him.
That's why brothers the importance of praying and learning to pray without ceasing, it doesn't matter if your prayer is small or big, poor in prose or rich.
Pray always pray that God wants to hear you to fulfill through Jesus Christ all your requests, according to God's timing.
Reflect and Answer:
1. What kind of prayer life did Jesus have?
2. What things, besides going to the cross, would have been difficult for Jesus to obey?
3. What things are difficult for you to do as a disciple?
4. Have you been praying with a loud cry and tears for God to help you be obedient?
5. About what situations in your life do you need to pray the most? Make a list and be specific
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