The Gospel of Mark (Part Seven)

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Elijah. Man of Courage, Man of Faith, Man of God.

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 <div class="label">9</div><div class="p"> 1And he said to them, &#8220;Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see that the kingdom of God has come with power.&#8221;</div><div class="s1">The Transfiguration</div><div class="p"> 2After six days Jesus took Peter, James and John with him and led them up a high mountain, where they were all alone. There he was transfigured before them. 3His clothes became dazzling white, whiter than anyone in the world could bleach them. 4And there appeared before them Elijah and Moses, who were talking with Jesus.</div><div class="p"> 5Peter said to Jesus, &#8220;Rabbi, it is good for us to be here. Let us put up three shelters&#8212;one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.&#8221; 6(He did not know what to say, they were so frightened.)</div><div class="p"> 7Then a cloud appeared and covered them, and a voice came from the cloud: &#8220;This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 8Suddenly, when they looked around, they no longer saw anyone with them except Jesus.</div><div class="p"> 9As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus gave them orders not to tell anyone what they had seen until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. 10They kept the matter to themselves, discussing what &#8220;rising from the dead&#8221; meant.</div><div class="p"> 11And they asked him, &#8220;Why do the teachers of the law say that Elijah must come first?&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 12Jesus replied, &#8220;To be sure, Elijah does come first, and restores all things. Why then is it written that the Son of Man must suffer much and be rejected? 13But I tell you, Elijah has come, and they have done to him everything they wished, just as it is written about him.&#8221;</div><div class="s1">Jesus Heals a Boy Possessed by an Impure Spirit</div><div class="p"> 14When they came to the other disciples, they saw a large crowd around them and the teachers of the law arguing with them. 15As soon as all the people saw Jesus, they were overwhelmed with wonder and ran to greet him.</div><div class="p"> 16 &#8220;What are you arguing with them about?&#8221; he asked.</div><div class="p"> 17A man in the crowd answered, &#8220;Teacher, I brought you my son, who is possessed by a spirit that has robbed him of speech. 18Whenever it seizes him, it throws him to the ground. He foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth and becomes rigid. I asked your disciples to drive out the spirit, but they could not.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 19 &#8220;You unbelieving generation,&#8221; Jesus replied, &#8220;how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy to me.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 20So they brought him. When the spirit saw Jesus, it immediately threw the boy into a convulsion. He fell to the ground and rolled around, foaming at the mouth.</div><div class="p"> 21Jesus asked the boy&#8217;s father, &#8220;How long has he been like this?&#8221;</div><div class="p">&#8220;From childhood,&#8221; he answered. 22&#8220;It has often thrown him into fire or water to kill him. But if you can do anything, take pity on us and help us.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 23 &#8220;&#8198;&#8216;If you can&#8217;?&#8221; said Jesus. &#8220;Everything is possible for one who believes.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 24Immediately the boy&#8217;s father exclaimed, &#8220;I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 25When Jesus saw that a crowd was running to the scene, he rebuked the impure spirit. &#8220;You deaf and mute spirit,&#8221; he said, &#8220;I command you, come out of him and never enter him again.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 26The spirit shrieked, convulsed him violently and came out. The boy looked so much like a corpse that many said, &#8220;He&#8217;s dead.&#8221; 27But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him to his feet, and he stood up.</div><div class="p"> 28After Jesus had gone indoors, his disciples asked him privately, &#8220;Why couldn&#8217;t we drive it out?&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 29He replied, &#8220;This kind can come out only by prayer.#9:29 Some manuscripts prayer and fasting&#8221;</div><div class="s1">Jesus Predicts His Death a Second Time</div><div class="p"> 30They left that place and passed through Galilee. Jesus did not want anyone to know where they were, 31because he was teaching his disciples. He said to them, &#8220;The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men. They will kill him, and after three days he will rise.&#8221; 32But they did not understand what he meant and were afraid to ask him about it.</div><div class="p"> 33They came to Capernaum. When he was in the house, he asked them, &#8220;What were you arguing about on the road?&#8221; 34But they kept quiet because on the way they had argued about who was the greatest.</div><div class="p"> 35Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said, &#8220;Anyone who wants to be first must be the very last, and the servant of all.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 36He took a little child whom he placed among them. Taking the child in his arms, he said to them, 37&#8220;Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me.&#8221;</div><div class="s1">Whoever Is Not Against Us Is for Us</div><div class="p"> 38&#8220;Teacher,&#8221; said John, &#8220;we saw someone driving out demons in your name and we told him to stop, because he was not one of us.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 39 &#8220;Do not stop him,&#8221; Jesus said. &#8220;For no one who does a miracle in my name can in the next moment say anything bad about me, 40for whoever is not against us is for us. 41Truly I tell you, anyone who gives you a cup of water in my name because you belong to the Messiah will certainly not lose their reward.</div><div class="s1">Causing to Stumble</div><div class="p"> 42 &#8220;If anyone causes one of these little ones&#8212;those who believe in me&#8212;to stumble, it would be better for them if a large millstone were hung around their neck and they were thrown into the sea. 43If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life maimed than with two hands to go into hell, where the fire never goes out. [44]#9:44 Some manuscripts include here the words of verse 48. 45And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than to have two feet and be thrown into hell. [46]#9:46 Some manuscripts include here the words of verse 48. 47And if your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell, 48where</div><div class="q1"> &#8220;&#8198;&#8216;the worms that eat them do not die,</div><div class="q2"> and the fire is not quenched.&#8217; # 9:48 
 Isaiah 66:24
 </div><div class="m"> 49 Everyone will be salted with fire.</div><div class="p"> 50 &#8220;Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can you make it salty again? Have salt among yourselves, and be at peace with each other.&#8221;</div>
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 <div class="label">9</div><div class="s1">Paul&#8217;s Anguish Over Israel</div><div class="p"> 1I speak the truth in Christ&#8212;I am not lying, my conscience confirms it through the Holy Spirit&#8212; 2I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. 3For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race, 4the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption to sonship; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises. 5Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of the Messiah, who is God over all, forever praised!#9:5 Or Messiah, who is over all. God be forever praised! Or Messiah. God who is over all be forever praised! Amen.</div><div class="s1">God&#8217;s Sovereign Choice</div><div class="p"> 6It is not as though God&#8217;s word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. 7Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham&#8217;s children. On the contrary, &#8220;It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.&#8221;#9:7 Gen. 21:12 8In other words, it is not the children by physical descent who are God&#8217;s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham&#8217;s offspring. 9For this was how the promise was stated: &#8220;At the appointed time I will return, and Sarah will have a son.&#8221;#9:9 Gen. 18:10,14</div><div class="p"> 10Not only that, but Rebekah&#8217;s children were conceived at the same time by our father Isaac. 11Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad&#8212;in order that God&#8217;s purpose in election might stand: 12not by works but by him who calls&#8212;she was told, &#8220;The older will serve the younger.&#8221;#9:12 Gen. 25:23 13Just as it is written: &#8220;Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.&#8221;#9:13 Mal. 1:2,3</div><div class="p"> 14What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! 15For he says to Moses,</div><div class="q1">&#8220;I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,</div><div class="q2">and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.&#8221;#9:15 Exodus 33:19</div><div class="m"> 16It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God&#8217;s mercy. 17For Scripture says to Pharaoh: &#8220;I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.&#8221;#9:17 Exodus 9:16 18Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.</div><div class="p"> 19One of you will say to me: &#8220;Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?&#8221; 20But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? &#8220;Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, &#8216;Why did you make me like this?&#8217;&#8198;&#8221;#9:20 Isaiah 29:16; 45:9 21Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?</div><div class="p"> 22What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath&#8212;prepared for destruction? 23What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory&#8212; 24even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles? 25As he says in Hosea:</div><div class="q1">&#8220;I will call them &#8216;my people&#8217; who are not my people;</div><div class="q2">and I will call her &#8216;my loved one&#8217; who is not my loved one,&#8221;#9:25 Hosea 2:23</div><div class="m"> 26and,</div><div class="q1">&#8220;In the very place where it was said to them,</div><div class="q2">&#8216;You are not my people,&#8217;</div><div class="q2">there they will be called &#8216;children of the living God.&#8217;&#8198;&#8221;#9:26 Hosea 1:10</div><div class="m"> 27Isaiah cries out concerning Israel:</div><div class="q1">&#8220;Though the number of the Israelites be like the sand by the sea,</div><div class="q2">only the remnant will be saved.</div><div class="q1"> 28For the Lord will carry out</div><div class="q2">his sentence on earth with speed and finality.&#8221;#9:28 Isaiah 10:22,23 (see Septuagint)</div><div class="m"> 29It is just as Isaiah said previously:</div><div class="q1">&#8220;Unless the Lord Almighty</div><div class="q2">had left us descendants,</div><div class="q1">we would have become like Sodom,</div><div class="q2">we would have been like Gomorrah.&#8221;#9:29 Isaiah 1:9</div><div class="s1">Israel&#8217;s Unbelief</div><div class="p"> 30What then shall we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; 31but the people of Israel, who pursued the law as the way of righteousness, have not attained their goal. 32Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone. 33As it is written:</div><div class="q1">&#8220;See, I lay in Zion a stone that causes people to stumble</div><div class="q2">and a rock that makes them fall,</div><div class="q2">and the one who believes in him will never be put to shame.&#8221;#9:33 Isaiah 8:14; 28:16</div>
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 <div class="label">37</div><div class="s1">Joseph&#8217;s Dreams</div><div class="p"> 1Jacob lived in the land where his father had stayed, the land of Canaan.</div><div class="b"></div><div class="p"> 2This is the account of Jacob&#8217;s family line.</div><div class="b"></div><div class="p">Joseph, a young man of seventeen, was tending the flocks with his brothers, the sons of Bilhah and the sons of Zilpah, his father&#8217;s wives, and he brought their father a bad report about them.</div><div class="p"> 3Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons, because he had been born to him in his old age; and he made an ornate#37:3 The meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain; also in verses 23 and 32. robe for him. 4When his brothers saw that their father loved him more than any of them, they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him.</div><div class="p"> 5Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him all the more. 6He said to them, &#8220;Listen to this dream I had: 7We were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright, while your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 8His brothers said to him, &#8220;Do you intend to reign over us? Will you actually rule us?&#8221; And they hated him all the more because of his dream and what he had said.</div><div class="p"> 9Then he had another dream, and he told it to his brothers. &#8220;Listen,&#8221; he said, &#8220;I had another dream, and this time the sun and moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 10When he told his father as well as his brothers, his father rebuked him and said, &#8220;What is this dream you had? Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow down to the ground before you?&#8221; 11His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the matter in mind.</div><div class="s1">Joseph Sold by His Brothers</div><div class="p"> 12Now his brothers had gone to graze their father&#8217;s flocks near Shechem, 13and Israel said to Joseph, &#8220;As you know, your brothers are grazing the flocks near Shechem. Come, I am going to send you to them.&#8221;</div><div class="p">&#8220;Very well,&#8221; he replied.</div><div class="p"> 14So he said to him, &#8220;Go and see if all is well with your brothers and with the flocks, and bring word back to me.&#8221; Then he sent him off from the Valley of Hebron.</div><div class="p">When Joseph arrived at Shechem, 15a man found him wandering around in the fields and asked him, &#8220;What are you looking for?&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 16He replied, &#8220;I&#8217;m looking for my brothers. Can you tell me where they are grazing their flocks?&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 17&#8220;They have moved on from here,&#8221; the man answered. &#8220;I heard them say, &#8216;Let&#8217;s go to Dothan.&#8217;&#8198;&#8221;</div><div class="p">So Joseph went after his brothers and found them near Dothan. 18But they saw him in the distance, and before he reached them, they plotted to kill him.</div><div class="p"> 19&#8220;Here comes that dreamer!&#8221; they said to each other. 20&#8220;Come now, let&#8217;s kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. Then we&#8217;ll see what comes of his dreams.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 21When Reuben heard this, he tried to rescue him from their hands. &#8220;Let&#8217;s not take his life,&#8221; he said. 22&#8220;Don&#8217;t shed any blood. Throw him into this cistern here in the wilderness, but don&#8217;t lay a hand on him.&#8221; Reuben said this to rescue him from them and take him back to his father.</div><div class="p"> 23So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe&#8212;the ornate robe he was wearing&#8212; 24and they took him and threw him into the cistern. The cistern was empty; there was no water in it.</div><div class="p"> 25As they sat down to eat their meal, they looked up and saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead. Their camels were loaded with spices, balm and myrrh, and they were on their way to take them down to Egypt.</div><div class="p"> 26Judah said to his brothers, &#8220;What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? 27Come, let&#8217;s sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him; after all, he is our brother, our own flesh and blood.&#8221; His brothers agreed.</div><div class="p"> 28So when the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for twenty shekels#37:28 That is, about 8 ounces or about 230 grams of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt.</div><div class="p"> 29When Reuben returned to the cistern and saw that Joseph was not there, he tore his clothes. 30He went back to his brothers and said, &#8220;The boy isn&#8217;t there! Where can I turn now?&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 31Then they got Joseph&#8217;s robe, slaughtered a goat and dipped the robe in the blood. 32They took the ornate robe back to their father and said, &#8220;We found this. Examine it to see whether it is your son&#8217;s robe.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 33He recognized it and said, &#8220;It is my son&#8217;s robe! Some ferocious animal has devoured him. Joseph has surely been torn to pieces.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 34Then Jacob tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and mourned for his son many days. 35All his sons and daughters came to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. &#8220;No,&#8221; he said, &#8220;I will continue to mourn until I join my son in the grave.&#8221; So his father wept for him.</div><div class="p"> 36Meanwhile, the Midianites#37:36 Samaritan Pentateuch, Septuagint, Vulgate and Syriac (see also verse 28); Masoretic Text Medanites sold Joseph in Egypt to Potiphar, one of Pharaoh&#8217;s officials, the captain of the guard.</div>
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