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T H E K I N G ' S B U S I N E S S
January, 1933
COMMENTARY Children’s Division In Holy Places B y H elen G ailey B y H erbert H. T a y
LESSON Golden Text Illustrations B y A lan S. P earce
Outline and Exposition B y B. B. S utcliffe
Blackboard Outlines B y B es S ie B. B urch
FEBRUARY S, 1933 JESUS CHOOSES THE TWELVE M ark 3 :7-35
be saved, there is needed, not only mental recognition of the claims of the Lord Jesus, but also acceptance o f His person as Saviour and Lord. The demons were not mistaken when they recognized Him as the Son of God. The only created intelligences which refuse to acclaim Jesus as the Son of God are the people who live upon the earth. No where else can any be found, in heaven or in hell, who refuse such acknowledgment. There are men upon earth today who are not as good as these demons—men who, in the face of established facts, refuse to acknowledge them; yet they would be in sulted I f described as being worse than demons. The demons testified to what they knew, but Jesus did not accept their testimony; He bade them be: silent. He could not accept testimony from such a source, nor will He accept the word of any one who, while rejecting Him as personal Saviour .and Lord, will speak smooth things con cerning Him. Proverbs 15 :8 declares that “the sacrifice of the wicked is an abomina tion to the Lord.” No. one can bear testi mony that is acceptable unto God, except those who have bowed in submission to His claims and become His children through faith in Jesus Christ. All others, the Bible classes as “wicked,” and the sac rifice o f such is abomination to God. The teacher has here an excellent opportunity to impress upon the scholars the impera tive need o f personal acceptance of Jesus Christ as Saviour. III. J esus and th e T welve (13-19a). The appointment of the twelve came after the Lord had spent a whole night in prayer, Luke tells us. These twelve were already numbered among, the Lord’s dis ciples, but were chosen f,or a special service. They were the apostles; they did not choose their places themselves, but were chosen by the Lord in His sovereign grace, to have fellowship with H imselfS'that they might be with him.” There could be no higher place for any created being than a place o f fellowship with Him who had come from the Father’s bosom and whose every word was a word of God. Today the Lord calls all His disciples to enter, with all other believers, into full fellow ship with Himself. To be with Him, to hear His Word, to abide in His presence, and to daily gather more and more under standing of Him is the possibility of every child of God. While He calls whom He will, yet those called must will to follow, even as these early disciples did. And they were called, not only to fellowship with Him, but to service for Him. When the twelve responded to the call, immediately, they were given authority by the Lord. He gave them power to preach, to heal, and to cast out demons—the work, the Lord was then doing. One of the out standing proofs of our Lord’s deity, even when in the guise o f the Servant, was His ability not only to perform miracles, but to pass on the same power to others. To speak the words of God and to do the works of God was the service unto which
Less'on T ext: Mark 3 ;7-19a. Golden T ext: “I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit” (John 15:16). The Hills of Galilee » » 7 i r n d he goeth up into a mountain, y 11| andcalleth unto him whom he / “ ■ would.” Except for, the Plain of Gennesaret on the west and the narrow Jordan valley on the south, the hills of Galilee rise almost abruptly from the lake. On the eastern shore, the rugged hills of
ceive Him, but they rejected Him because they ‘ hated Him. This is the underlying cause of today’s rejection* o f the Lord. Simply to refuse to accept Him as Saviour and Lord is to advertise hatred o f Him. But as Jesus left the Pharisees, great crowds began to gather about Him. They came from all directions, when they heard of the great things He did. He healed many, and the crowd pressed upon him. There was healing in His touch, and the people wanted healing. Granting it, His gracious compassion was seen, even though the leaders o f the people had rejected Him and His claims,'; His fame grew because of His deeds, but He was soon cast out because o f his words. The world desires the deeds of the Lord, but it rejects His Word, and it is in His Word alone that permanent blessing is found. The healings, miracles, etc., are but by-products. . The Lord’s purpose for the multitude was to give them the W ord of God, and teach them the truth, in order that they might have salvation for their souls. He was in terested in their eternal welfare more than in their temporary blessing. There were people in the Lord’s day, as there are many today, who believed in the works He per formed, because they had ocular demon stration o f them. But because they had no faith, these men and women did not believe His w ord; hence, His coming to earth did them little or no good. To ad mire Jesus as a Wonder-worker and deny His claims to be the Saviour and Lord is to side with Satan and end in the pit. II. J esus and the D emons (1 1 ,1 2 ). The demons recognized Jesus as the Son of God. They knew who He was, and they knew why He had come. His coming was the mark o f their doom, and they thought, their time had come. What th^t doom is to be, we have no way of telling; but that it is to be indescribably awful we can well imagine by the despair Christ’s coming brought to those of whom we study in this passage. It is sometimes thought that all that is .needed today is an intel lectual assent to the fact that Jesus is really what He claimed to b e; but here we see that demons gave intellectual assent, but they were not saved. Before one can
Gilead tumble precip itously . down to the very brink of the lake. On the western shore, a few fairly level spots provide a small flat s u r f a c e upon whi c h the an c i e nt cities' of Bethsaida, C a p e r n a u m , and Chorazin once -lay.
But immediately beyond the ruins o f these cities, the rocky hills rise to heights of several thousand feet. The Sea of Galilee is locked within its mountain walls, a prisoner from the outer life of the province of Galilee. There are several rugged defiles up which the inhabitants of this region can find egress to the outer world. One such magnificent canyon leads from the-south ern end o f the Plain of Gennesaret up to the table-topped mount called by the na tives “Kurn Hattin,” but localized by Christian pilgrims as the scene of the ser mon on the mount, and called the “Mount o f Beatitudes.” As most travelers do, we came to the Sea of Galilee from. Nazareth, and passed this sacred site on our way. It was necessary to walk a mile or two through fields of sharp, prickly thistles, but the view from the mount was ample re muneration for the pain of the walk. There below us, and about five rpiles away, fas tened into its golden setting of Galilean hills by its silver band of pebbled beauh, lay that azure gem, the Sea o f Galilee. We gazed long and admiringly at this beautiful scene, thinking of the inspiration which it must have given to our Lord as He gazed upon it so long ago. Outline and Exposition I. J esus and th e M ultitude (7 -1 0 ). After healing the man with a withered hand, Jesus was accused by the Pharisees, and they sought to have Him ldlled. It was then that He withdrew Himself from them. Perhaps there are no more solemn words in the Bible than these: “Jesus with drew himself.? ; He left them because they refused to have Him. The separation which exists between God and man is es tablished and maintained- by man himself, and not by God. The Pharisees had had opportunity to know the- Lord and to re
BLACKBOARD LESSON
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