Chapter # 6 Paragraph # 5 Study # 2
February 8, 2022
Moss Bluff, Louisiana
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Thesis: There are three major "problems" which Jesus was committed to resolving in order to prepare The Twelve for their realm of labor: darkness; misplaced confidence; and the realm of Death.
Introduction: In our last study we considered the reason Jesus was urgently insistent about getting the disciples away from the crowd. The disciples had within themselves the same seeds of delusion that had captivated the crowd: the notion that "Life"
consists in being able to control both "life" and "others". There are unmistakable shadows of "militarism" in the text and Jesus' demonstration of an ability to provide "life" for thousands resulted in a "flawed" conclusion: that "life" is what is important and that "control" over its events, and the people who were constant producers of those events, is the "bottom line" as the fundamental mechanism of "life".
Mark's record, so far in our studies, has been predominantly "life" focused in that He is known for "life" producing miracles and "control" over the unclean spirits who make "life" intolerable. The actual fact is that Jesus was doing "miracles" in the realm of "life" as illustrations of His capacities in the realm of "Life", but the crowds were so completely absorbed in "life" that they had no real interest in "Life". And this is true in spite of the fact that Jesus' most fundamental message was of "repentance unto forgiveness of sins unto Life" and the fact that He deliberately tied "forgiveness" to the physical level miracles (2:1-12) so that those who could "see" would know that they were for the purpose of "illustration only". Chapter four is given over to the fact that "life" is a collection of "parables" that signify far greater truths than they can contain in themselves.
- I. The Three "Parables" Of The "Problems Of 'Life'".
- A. Darkness as a "parable" of blindness (heavily emphasized by Mark in this section of his record).
- 1. The text literally says, "And evening having come...".
- a. Mark's use of "evening" is elastic.
- 1) His first use in 1:32 defines "evening" as "after the sun had set" [the context is the bondage of the people to "Sabbath rules"].
- 2) His second use in 4:35 does not give a precise "timing" except that Jesus had finished His "teaching by way of parable" [the context is the "setup" for the storm experience with Jesus asleep in the boat: it results in the question, "Do you yet have no faith?" and the second question, "Who, then, is this...?"].
- 3) His third use is the text we are currently studying [the context is Jesus' "terrifying" walk on the waters of the sea and the characterization of the disciples as having "hardened" hearts because they had gained no insight from the miracle of the loaves].
- 4) The fourth use in 14:17 is the observance of the Passover [the context is the announcement that "...one of you will betray me..." and the institution of the "parable" of "eating the body of Jesus" and "drinking the blood of the New Covenant"].
- 5) The last use in 15:42 is the entombment of the body of Jesus just before the Passover was set to begin.
- 6) Therefore, the uses do not focus upon an "exact timing", but, rather, what was going on so that we have to understand that Jesus had already sent The Twelve away in the boat and that the most probable issue of "evening" is the darkness that it brings in the light of the other use that it has that has overtones of "a second time around".
- b. The aorist tense of the verb indicates that the "evening" had already arrived (the Greek in this text is exactly like that of 1:32 so that it was already "dark").
- 1) Thus, as in 1:32 there were "larger issues" involved.
- 2) The only "larger issues" here are the parallelism between 4:35-41 and the more fundamental reality of the presence of the darkness of night.
- 3) This, as a beginning of Mark's record of the disciples' lack of understanding (directly stated in 6:52) strongly implies that the darkness has become a metaphor/parable of the disciples' inability to "see" (the issue in both the physical realm and the relational realm).
- 2. So, we conclude that Mark told us of the "timing" so that we might begin to "see" what the disciples did not "see": this is the first "problem" Jesus faced with His "Twelve".
- B. The "boat" as a "parable" of misplaced confidence (immediately emphasized by Mark in the first chapter of the next section).
- 1. Mark has 15 references to a "boat" in his Gospel.
- 2. The first two references (1:19-20) reveal Jesus summoning the first four of The Twelve away from their "livelihood" and using the "parable" of "fishing" to establish their "calling".
- 3. The fourth and fifth references (4:36-37) are in the previous "parallel passage" where the "boat" is revealed to be wholly inadequate when upon a violently stormy sea and "at issue" is first time Jesus uses a stormy sea to raise the question of His identity and the "faith" to which He summons The Twelve.
- 4. Five of the fifteen references are in this chapter (Six) of Mark's record and the "boat" figures significantly in the narrative, beginning with the "vacation" The Twelve never got and ending with the continual presence of a "crowd" so that they never were going to get it.
- a. Within these five references we have the second time the same issues are involved as in the first time they faced a storm.
- b. The issues are "the darkness", "the contrary wind", "the futility of trying to get the boat to do what they want it to", "the contrast between Jesus being 'asleep' and not being there at all, and "the similarity of the disciples' failure to 'see' the point of their experience".
- 5. The fourteenth (and last) use in 8:14 is involved with the entire umbrella of issues found in chapters 6-8.
- 6. Thus, the issue of the "boat" is the issue of a completely misguided "confidence" in a "boat's" ability to deliver them from an environment of death: this is the second "problem" Jesus has to overcome if the disciples are ever going to be capable "apostles".
- C. The "sea" as a "parable" of the massive danger to humankind that their "environment" produces.
- 1. The "sea" was the "source of life" as far as the initial disciples were concerned.
- 2. This "source of life" was clearly known simultaneously as an extremely dangerous "source of death".
- 3. The "sea" is more of an environment of death than it is "of life" [in the final state, "there is no more sea" (Revelation 21:1)].
- 4. That the disciples are more afraid of "death" than they are convinced of the Promise of Life is the third "problem" that Jesus faced in regard to His task of turning "disciples" into "apostles".
- II. The "Fourth Parable": Jesus' Commitment To His Task.
- A. Mark simply says that Jesus "alone on the land", or, more accurately "alone on the earth".
- B. These are the same words the Septuagint uses of Adam's condition before Eve was created to be a "suitable helper" to him.
- C. The imagery is extremely "theologically" parallel.
- 1. Adam needed "help" and none of the animal kingdom was suitable.
- 2. Adam needed a "wife".
- 3. Though Jesus does not "need" a "wife", His entire earthly ministry was all about "procuring one", according to Ephesians 5:25-27; Revelation 19:7; 21:2, and 9 and 22:17), and John the Baptizer identified Jesus as the bridegroom early on in the ministry of Jesus (John 3:29).
