Keep Praying

Stay Focused on the Lord

Keep Reading Your Bible

Mark 6 Loaves and Fishes

From five loaves and two fish, Jesus thanked God and created enough food to feed from between 20 and 25 thousand people, and have enough left over to satisfy the hunger of His disciples. From the biggest miracle to the slightest detail, God was involved. Is He not then involved in every aspect of your life?

Too Many Words

Sometimes I think we would be better off without so many words. Even in our prayers, we can be so full of words that God can't get a word in edgewise. The next time you pray, when you are finished, ask God to speak to you, and then be still in your mind and listen.

Mark 6 Without Honor

The Jews were offended with Jesus because He claimed to be God, and because He showed that He cared for Gentiles. But in this case, they were offended at Him because He lived in their city and was one of their brothers. This is basic jealousy. They were saying, "He is one of us, why should we think highly of Him?" And, "How could one of our brothers be God?" Isaiah 53, however, says One would come and die for the sins of His people. This was written 700 years before Christ was born.

Mark 6 Jesus Sends Out The Twelve

The message of the twelve: repent.

Mark 6 John the Baptist Beheaded

Jesus called John the Baptist the greatest man ever born.

Jewish Feasts

God is our Strength and our Shield

"Only Believe"

Jesus said to Jairus in Mark 5:36, “Only believe." Jairus’ daughter was sick, and in fact was about to die. Jairus had asked Jesus for healing, and Jesus said, “Only believe.” After she died, Jesus came to her and raised her back to life.

My question is, What does only believe mean?
Here are some incorrect answers:
Believe that his daughter would be raised from the dead.
Believe that if his faith were strong enough physical healing would occur.
Believe that all of our prayers will be answered as we want them to be, when we want them to be, and in our own timing. This includes physical healing, finances, marriages, families, world peace, and fun in general.
Believe that we will get exactly what we want for Christmas.
Just believe - Only believe.

The question remains: What does Jesus ask us to believe?
That He is God
That He is able to do all things
That He is truly concerned about every detail of our lives
That He will work all things for the good, for those who love Him

It’s quite obvious that the term, “Only believe,” can be grossly misinterpreted.

God's Power and Perfect Timing

At the same time Jesus waited for the daughter to die, He was healing the woman with an issue of blood. His timing was, as usual, perfect. Here is what is amazing to me: He who has the power to create and maintain everything in the universe, felt it when power left Him in the healing of the woman. How can He have such vast power on the one hand, yet be so personal with His power on the other? It means that every time He does something for us, He senses a power change within Himself! Does He sense every blade of grass when it withers?

The Rod for the Fool

Spiritual Disciplines

Physical disciplines are like brushing your teeth and exercising regularly, eating carefully and not too much, and just plain taking care of yourself, but what are spiritual disciplines? These are things like praying and giving regularly, Bible reading and study, going to church, going to a group Bible study, and all kinds of service projects for the Lord.

This is what I learned long ago in my walk with the Lord. A spiritual discipline is like a "path" that leads to the Lord. As long as I keep my focus on the Lord I am able to stay on the path. But if I put my focus on the "path," and not the Lord, I soon fall away from the discipline. So here is my prayer for you and me, that we keep our focus on the Lord as we continue on our path of reading through the Bible in one year.

Mark 5

Jesus heals a demon possessed man and then orders him to go back to the areas that knew him so that he would be a witness to the amazing transformation that had occurred.

Leviticus 19

Leviticus 20 Set Apart

Jesus Calms the Storm

Psalm 27

Blood

Dream I had from viewing the Passion of the Christ

Homosexuality

So much for alternative lifestyles.

Holy Things

In all these instructions, God was showing the Israelites that they must have a profound reverence for holy things; and nothing was more suited to that purpose than to bar from the tabernacle all who were polluted by any kind of uncleanness, ceremonial as well as natural, physical as well as spiritual.


In order to mark out His people as dwelling before Him in holiness, He required of them complete purity and didn’t allow them to come before Him when defiled, even by involuntary or secret impurities. And when one considers that God was training a people to live in His presence, it becomes apparent that these rules for the maintenance of personal purity, pointing to the necessity of purity in the heart, were neither too stringent nor too minute.

by John MacArthur in the

MarArthur Study Bible, p 176

The Day of Atonement

A House Divided

The Pharisees saw the miracles of Jesus and claimed that He did His miracles by the power of Satan. But we know that Jesus did His miracles by the power of the Holy Spirit. This is a type of blasphemy that cannot not be forgiven. It is a blasphemy against the Holy Spirit of God. But Jesus answered them by saying that if He was healing (which is good) by Satan (who is evil), then Satan is divided. Evil cannot do good.

Jesus Binds Satan

At the cross, Jesus bound Satan so that we could be free.

Seek the Will of God

The Spreading Mildew

Notice that it is God who puts the spreading mildew in the house. Why would He do that?

Jesus and Fasting

The old garment and old wineskin represent the Old Covenant. The new patch and new wine represent something new that is coming - the New Covenant.

Jesus Declares Himself the Lord of the Sabbath

The Pharisees made a god out of the Sabbath.

Jesus Heals on the Sabbath

The Sluggard

Be Holy for God is Holy

The command to be holy is given both in the Old and New Testaments. Holiness requires separation from sin. The neighbors of the Israelites were in great sin. Their pagan rituals included idolatry, sacrificing their babies in the fire, orgies, homosexuality, drunkenness, and debauchery. They ate all sorts of “unclean” foods. To develop separation from them, God gave the Israelites dietary laws and regulations that prohibited them from eating the kinds of foods the pagans ate.

The ceremonial eating of certain foods and not others was an outward expression of what God was trying to do in the hearts of the Israelites. He desired that they be separated from sin, and used food as an object lesson. He wanted ceremonial holiness to carry over into heart holiness. Later, in Deuteronomy 10:16 and 30:6, He would instruct the Israelites to circumcise their hearts, meaning to cut away the sin that surrounded their hearts. Paul also referred to the cutting away of sin from the heart in Romans 2:28-29, and said this must be done by the Holy Spirit of God.

In the New Testament, God declared all foods to be acceptable, if eaten for the glory of God, Acts 10:9-15; 1 Corinthians 10:31. In this way, God again used food as an object lesson, but this time to break down the barrier between Jew and Gentile and form one body, the Church.

“Whatever you do, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God.” Being holy begins in the heart and then radiates out into the life. The Holy Spirit has joined with our hearts to make them stronger and guide us into all holiness.

The Healing of the Paralytic

Notice that Jesus healed the paralytic based

upon the faith of his friends. For all we

know the paralytic may have been

completely unconscious.

Fear the Lord

The Wise and Foolish Son

Jesus Heals Many

Mark presents Jesus as the Healer.

Hope in the Lord

Seek Him while He may be found.

Stolen Water

Wanting and seeking what is not ours has

great temptation but leaves us in the dust.

Nadab and Abihu

Two of the sons of Aaron dishonored God.

They did not treat God as holy and

they did not glorify God.

Mark 1

John the Baptist prepares the way.
He is the last of the Old Testament prophets.

He is Risen

Darkness is defeated but it

is not through with us.

Psalm 24

Leviticus 5-6

Covered by Grace

In Leviticus 4, unintentional sin is “temporarily” covered by animal sacrifices. Unintentional means to stray into a sinful situation, but not necessarily by surprise. Unintentional sins are usually considered sins of neglect or omission, and viewed as involuntary. These sins were later covered “eternally” by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, through the grace of God, "if" the one who sinned was genuinely repentant and a true believer. He would be called an Old Testament saint.

In Numbers 15:30-31 intentional sin was discussed. There was no temporary covering for intentional sin, which was characterized as presumptuous, and came from a defiant attitude. These sins were committed knowingly and deliberately (voluntary) and were blasphemous because they were arrogant acts of insubordination against the Lord’s laws. The punishment was death or banishment from the people. But was there any hope for the one who sinned intentionally?

Could there be eternal covering for the one who intentional sinned? By the grace of God, the answer is “yes.” Jesus said in Matthew 12:31-32, “Therefore I say to you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men…and to anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him…” The presumptuous, arrogant, defiant, sinner in Numbers 15 could receive eternal covering, “if” there was genuine repentance, and sincere faith in God.

In the past, you and I have committed many intentional and unintentional sins, and “if” we have repented and turned to Christ for salvation, those sins have been fully forgiven, covered eternally by the grace of God. All our sins have been forgiven, past, present and future. And as we live out our lives, we have this continued blessing when we sin. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness,” 1 John 1:9.

The 23 Psalm