Mark 3

1 – 2

Another time when Jesus went into a synagogue, a man with a crippled hand was there. Some people there wanted to see Jesus do something wrong so they could accuse Him. They watched Him closely to see if He would heal the man on the Sabbath day.

The Jews had laws that said that you could save a life on the Lord’s day but you could not heal. The person that Jesus is the most interested in is the person who needs Him the most.

3 – 4

Jesus said to the man with the crippled hand, “Stand up here in front of everyone.” Then Jesus asked the people, “Which is right on the Sabbath day: to do good, or to do evil? Is it right to save a life or to destroy one?” But they said nothing to answer Him.

There are churches who do not want ungodly people to come to their services because they are afraid of such people. Jesus is asking these churches today, “Is it a good thing to see someone’s life changed in this church on Sunday?”

5. Jesus was angry as He looked at the people. But He felt very sad because they were stubborn. Then He said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” The man put His hand out for Jesus, and it was healed.

God tells us to take the first step. We say that we cannot even take one step but God says that if we will try then He take over and do the things that are impossible for us. When we laugh at this and say that it would be stupid to even take this first step then we will never see what God can do.

What kind of God would tell you to do these things and then not help you? He knows your heart and if you will try then He will show you what He can do. If you do not want to try then you will stay where you are!

6. Then the Pharisees left and began making plans with the Herodians about a way to kill Jesus.

There are some ministries who think that they need to destroy another ministry because they are not doing things the way that someone thinks they should.

John said to Jesus, “Teacher, we saw someone using your name to cast out demons, but we told him to stop because he wasn’t in our group.”

“Do not stop him!” Jesus said. “No one who performs a miracle in My name will not be able to speak evil of Me. Anyone who is not against us is for us.” Mark 9:38-40

7 – 10

Jesus left with His followers for the lake. A large crowd from Galilee followed him. Also many people came from Judea, from Jerusalem, from Idumea, from the lands across the Jordan River, and from the area of Tyre and Sidon. They came because they had heard about all the things Jesus was doing.

Jesus saw the crowds. So He told His followers to get a boat ready for Him. He wanted the boat so that the many people would not crowd themselves against Him. He had healed many people. So all the sick were pushing toward Him to touch Him.

If you had a serious problem then you would be trying to get closer to Jesus also!

11 – 12

Some had evil spirits in them. When the evil spirits saw Jesus, they fell down before Him and shouted, “You are the Son of God!” But Jesus strongly commanded the spirits not to tell who He was.

We do not let demons speak about the Gospel. They will pretend that they are teaching something about God and later add some lies and people will follow.

13 – 19

Then Jesus went up on a hill and called some men to come to Him. These were the men Jesus wanted, and they went up to Him. Jesus chose 12 men and called them apostles. He wanted these 12 to be with Him, and He wanted to send them to other places to teach.

He also wanted them to have the authority to send demons out of people. These are the 12 men He chose: Simon (Jesus gave him the name Peter); James and John, the sons of Zebedee. Jesus gave them the name Boanerges, which means “Sons of Thunder.”

Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James the son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot, and Judas Iscariot. Judas is the one who gave Jesus to His enemies.

There is no gift of sending demons out of people. God has given us the authority to do this in His name. There are no experts in this kind of ministry. If any Christian will fill himself with God’s Words and humble himself in prayer and fasting, God will hear even the weakest of us and send demons away in Jesus’ name.

There is a story of a quiet man who never spoke very much. He thought a prayer in his heart asking God to send demons away from someone he loved. The person immediately shouted, “What just happened? Where did they go?”

Jesus had His own names for each of His followers. We know we are close friends when someone calls us by a special name. See Revelation 2:17

20 – 21

Then Jesus went back home. But again a crowd gathered. There were so many people that Jesus and His followers could not eat. His family heard about all these things. They went to get Him because people kept on saying that Jesus was out of His mind.

People will think we are crazy if we decide we will live only by the Bible and spend our lives bringing other people to Jesus.

They will say, “That is so good that you try to help people but I could never do that. I would not help all these people because God only helps those who help themselves.”

They will say many other stupid things like this because they do not see how to walk in the Spirit but they only see what they can see in this world.

22. And the teachers of the law from Jerusalem kept on saying, “Beelzebul is living inside Him! He uses power from the ruler of demons to send demons out.”
We always know that any accusation that keeps on being repeated against us is not from God.
Luke 11:19–22

23 – 27

So Jesus called the people together and used stories to teach them. He said, “Satan will not send his own demons out of people. A kingdom that fights against itself cannot continue. And a family that is divided cannot continue.

And if Satan is against himself and fights against his own people, then he cannot continue. And that is the end of Satan. If a person wants to enter a strong man’s house and steal his things, first he must tie up the strong man. Then the thief can steal the things from the strong man’s house.

Jesus is showing them that the demons have places that they call their own because men have given these places to them. There is a group of demons who rule over the area where you live. We see that there was such a place in Persia. Daniel 10:13

Jesus is saying that we steal or take back the things that have been given to the devil. We can only do this if we first ask God to chain the demons so that we can take back what they have.

Here is how demons build a strong house: first they bring thoughts to your mind, then they suggest that you stay away from other Christians, they then suggest that they will tell people some stupid things you have done.

If you allow these thoughts to stay in your mind you are giving the demons a place to build a house. They can only be made to leave if you take back what you gave them -your thoughts and permission to work in your life!

For when a strong man like Satan is fully armed and guards his house, his possessions are safe—until someone even stronger attacks and overpowers him, strips him of his weapons, and carries off his belongings. Luke 11:19–22

28 – 29

I tell you the truth. All sins that people do can be forgiven. And all the bad things people say against God can be forgiven. But any person who says bad things against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven. He is guilty of a sin that continues forever.”

The only sin that cannot be forgiven is turning away from Jesus. Anyone who will not listen to the plain truth of Jesus is getting close to a sin which cannot be forgiven.

The devil tells some people that they have done something that cannot be forgiven. These people will go around in circles saying that there is no use trying to live for Jesus because they have gone too far. The truth is that if they really had done a sin that could not be forgiven then they would not even care about it. Unless they have pushed away Jesus they can be forgiven!

30. Jesus said this because the teachers of the law said that Jesus had an evil spirit inside Him.

When Jesus does something like change a man’s life the world tries to come up with another idea of why this man has changed. They refuse to see that only Jesus could have done this.

31 – 35

Then Jesus’ mother and brothers arrived. They stood outside and sent someone in to tell Him to come out. Many people were sitting around Jesus. They said to him, “Your mother and brothers are waiting for You outside.”

Jesus asked, “Who is My mother? Who are My brothers?” Then Jesus looked at those sitting around Him. He said, “Here are My mother and My brothers! My true brother and sister and mother are those who do the things God wants.”

Jesus was not saying anything bad about His family. He was saying these things to show us that those who have given their lives to Him are as close as His own family was to Him.