[T]he scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and “by the prince of demons he casts out the demons.”

Mark 3:22-30

[T]he scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and “by the prince of demons he casts out the demons.” Mark 3:22

I continue my study of Mark, leaning on the Christ-Centered Exposition commentary series volume for Mark.  Today, I focus on a commentary-assisted review of Mark 3:22, which is the text for the first (of three) division of 3:22-30 per the commentary. Excerpts from the commentary's introduction to 3:22-30 and for the first division:

• Main idea of 3:22-30 per the commentary: "Some are so hardened in their rejection of Jesus as God’s true Messiah that they attribute to Satan the works of the Holy Spirit done through Jesus, and they will never be forgiven."
• The concept of an eternal sin - where forgiveness is never available - is discussed.  "Whatever this sin is, we must approach it with the greatest possible gravity and seriousness. When God effectively says, “Commit this sin and I will never forgive you,” there is then no longer any hope for heaven and eternal life."
• Demonstration of this eternal sin - blasphemy against God - "reveals a hardened heart that calls good evil."
• This sin is defined as "a persistent rejection of and declaration against what the Spirit of God is doing in and through Jesus."
• "Those who move in the direction of the unpardonable sin are aware of the miraculous works of Jesus that cannot be denied. The scribes at no point deny He has cast out demons! In addition, this unpardonable sin is characterized by consistently rejecting the obvious and logical conclusion that these spiritual works are done by the Spirit of God."     

There are many who mock God.  It is not my place to identify who these people are but only to believe in the Bible that shares that since the Fall, sin and brokenness exists and God is allowing Satan and sin to persist until He finally defeats Satan as described in Revelation 20:10.  My response to sin and brokenness is to stand on Truth and to put on the whole armor of God as described in Ephesians 6:10-20.  I know what Jesus has done for me with 100% certainty and what He continues to do - His mercies never cease and are new every morning and He continues to intercede on my behalf with the Father daily.  He gives me the Holy Spirit and will never leave or forsake me. He goes before me and leads me.  Without Him I am nothing.  The rich blessings go on and on...

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My Prayer: Heavenly Father, You are an awesome God and You are SO good to me - You save, and You forgive as Your mercies never cease and and are new every morning - for those who believe.  Thank You Jesus for my salvation and for the blessings that You pour out in inexhaustible supply.  I am not deserving of my salvation, nor any of the blessings You pour out for me.  My sin is great and it continues...daily.  Please forgive and help me overcome and turn from my sin towards You.  Help me love You with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love others as You love me.  Help me grow in my faith.  Give Lisa and myself wisdom and strength.  Please continue to heal Lisa of her cancer and from the side effects of chemo.  Help us lead Zach and Dustin to You Jesus and for them to choose You as their Lord and Savior.  Please provide Godly friends and spouses to Zach and Dustin.  Help me serve You, my family, my church, and others.  Help me understand, be obedient to, and apply Your message for me today and every day. 

The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. And he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. And he was with the wild animals, and the angels were ministering to him.

 Mark 1:12-13

The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. And he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. And he was with the wild animals, and the angels were ministering to him. Mark 1:12-13

I continue my study of Mark, leaning on the Christ-Centered Exposition commentary series volume for Mark.  This morning, I focus on a commentary-assisted review of Mark 1:12-13 - the second division of Mark 1:9-13 per my commentary. The commentary shares how this text describes Satan's temptation of Christ (see also Matthew 4:1-11, Luke 4:1-13) was a "declaration of war."  Excerpts from the commentary:

•  "Jesus’ temptation was no accidental encounter, no chance meeting. It was a divine appointment scheduled by the Father and implemented by the Spirit."
• "Thankfully, Jesus yields to the Spirit and embraces this test. The Servant King has a job to do, and the Spirit immediately compels Him. Rather than shrinking back, as Israel was so prone to do, our King, our Commander in Chief, the true Israel goes out to fight in the trenches with us and for us. In so doing He turns back the enemy and provides hope and a pattern for us to do the same."
• "This was the deep wilderness. This was no vacation spot. The conditions were grueling, and Jesus was undoubtedly tired and weak. To grumble, complain, or give in would have been easy."
• Jesus' response in the wilderness contrasts with that of Israel who constantly grumbled and complained.  This wilderness is also similar to that of Moses' 40 days on Mt Sinai and Elijah's 40 days on Mt Horeb - see Exodus 34:28, 1 Kings 19:8. 
• Believers should be encouraged as Christ knows the battles we are fighting and we can take comfort in knowing that Satan does not win this battle nor the war which ends in Revelation.   

Just as the angels were ministering to Jesus in the wilderness, so too does Jesus aid us in our time of temptation and need - when we may feel tempted to grumble, complain (about God no less!), and lose faith.  See Ephesians 6:10-18 for how we are provided with the whole armor of God.  Know and love God by reading and studying scripture - all of it - and experience how the whole armor of God protects us against Satan's schemes.  

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My Prayer: Father God, You are an awesome God that provides us with the whole armor of God to protect us from Satan's schemes.  Thank You Jesus!  I am not deserving of how You save and how You protect.  My sin is still great and it continues...daily.  Please forgive me Jesus and help me overcome and turn from my sin towards You.  Help me love You with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love others as You love me.  Help me grow in my faith.  Give Lisa and myself wisdom and strength.  Please continue to heal Lisa of her cancer and from the side effects of chemo.  Help us lead Zach and Dustin to You Jesus and for them to choose You as their Lord and Savior.  Please provide Godly friends and spouses to Zach and Dustin.  Help me serve You, my family, my church, and others.  Help me understand, be obedient to, and apply Your message for me today and every day. 

The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still.

Exodus 14:14

The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still. Exodus 14:14

I continue my study of The Character of Jesus.  For this morning, I focus on chapter 15: The Firmness of Jesus where I highlighted in my Kindle version the following excerpts:

• "The majority of mortals are not strong enough to be themselves: they become echoes of their neighbors and walk in paths marked out by others. There is a spirit of the age which leaves its impress on every mind. Even the mightiest men cannot free themselves entirely from it."
• "But when we come to Jesus of Nazareth we are in the presence of a man whom nobody swerved or dominated, who is so free from the bias of his race and so clean of the spirit of his age that he seems to belong to all races and all ages. He is not the Son of David but the Son of Man, just genuinely, supremely human. He is not a citizen of the first century only, but the contemporary of each succeeding generation. Immersed in an ocean of mighty forces which beat upon him furiously through every hour of his career, he resisted them all successfully by the indomitable energy of a victorious will, living a life unique in its beauty and achieving a work unmarred by the limitations either of time or place. That he was not insensible to the dominant forces of his time, he himself has told us in the story of the temptation." See Matthew 4:1-11.
• "Who is a man that he should set himself against the expressed wish of a nation? Is it not through the people that God makes his wishes known, and what is it but egotism or insanity which would lead an individual to set his judgment against the judgment of the people ? This is the argument whose sharp edge many a leader has felt, and Jesus of Nazareth felt it too. Wherever he went he heard the people clamoring for a king, a king who should rise to supremacy over the wrecked empire of Caesar.  The nation was ripe for revolution. A word from him would, like a spark, have kindled a mighty conflagration. Expectations had been built up by men anointed by Jehovah, and these expectations were glowing hot, and how could Jesus hope to win the attention of his people or control the current of their life unless he fell in with their ideals and attempted to carry out the program on which their hearts were set? It was a great temptation, so terrific that he told his apostles all about it.  He assured them that in this temptation he had been wrestling with the very prince of infernal powers, but that notwithstanding repeated assaults he had come out of the conflict victorious. In choosing the road which led to supremacy by way of Gethsemane and Golgotha, he renounced the ideals of his countrymen and disappointed their dearest expectations, but so firm was he that the hosts of hell speaking through God's chosen people could not move him from his place. The nation hurled itself with frantic force against him, but he did not budge. He was the Rock of Ages. When we study his life with attentive eyes we see it was one long resistance to the forces of his age."
• "There were many reasons why Jesus should have conformed to the ideas and customs of the church, but he firmly resisted all the voices which urged him toward conformity, standing out alone in defiance of what the best men were doing and saying, notwithstanding his nonconformity seemed to the majority impiety and to many blasphemy. For a godly man to be classed among blasphemers is one of the bitterest experiences which the heart can know. But Jesus paid the price and continued firm."
• "Jesus could not be manipulated. He refused to be used. One party after another tried to work him into its scheme, but he was incorrigibly intractable and went on his way independent, unshackled, free. All the seductions offered by the men who sat on thrones could not swerve him from his course, and although his steadfastness made him enemies and finally nailed him to the cross, he was everywhere and always a man who could not be moved." 
• "Jesus could not be manipulated even by his friends. He had many friends in Nazareth, but he never gave up his principles to please them. They had their prejudices and superstitions, but he never surrendered to them."
• "The most tender and gracious and obliging of men is compelled to resist not only the prayers of his countrymen but the wishes of his family and friends. He stands like a rock in the midst of a troubled sea, and all its billows dash themselves against his feet in vain. There was something inflexible in his will, something granitic in his soul. When he found a man whom he thought worthy to be the first member of his church he called him "rock.  Are we to infer from this that it is the rock-like quality which is indispensable in the building of an institution which shall endure? It is certain that Jesus loved stability in others, and what he loved in others he had super-abundantly in himself. Firm himself, he loved men who could not be moved."
• "Salvation could not be offered to any one who did not endure to the end. It is in this tenacity of will that we find an indispensable element of Christian character. Men are to resist exterior forces and form their life from within. They are not to be swayed by current opinion, but by the spirit of the Eternal in their heart. They are not to listen to the voices of time, but to live and work for eternity. We like this steadfastness in human character, and we also crave it in God. Men have always loved to think of Him as the unchanging and the unchangeable, the one "with whom can be no variation, neither shadow that is cast by turning." And what we desire in God we find in Jesus of Nazareth."
• "From age to age he is about his Father's business, and in the midst of all nations and kindreds and tongues he goes about doing good." 

While the commentary provides ample evidence of Jesus’ firmness in scripture, the Holy Spirit guides me to additional examples in scripture of how we as believers must also be firm.  An unwavering faith – resisting temptations to either lack trust in God to provide and protect, or to act outside of God’s commands in the face of worldly temptations and persecution –  demonstrates firmness consistent with Jesus’ own character and what He commands and expects from us.  Two examples where firmness was not displayed - even among biblical heroes - was when Peter denied knowing Jesus upon Jesus' arrest (see Mark 14:66-72), and Abraham lying that Sarah was his sister (see Genesis 20:1-2).  Believers know that temptations will arise and that the only way to battle these temptations is with the whole armor of God (Ephesians 6:10-20).  Exodus 14:14 tells us to be "still" or "silent" and to trust in God vs falling prey to temptations where we seek to take things into our own hands (acting outside God's counsel). Philippians 1:27 and Romans 12:2 urge us to stand firm in our faith and not to conform to the patterns of this world - instead we are to be transformed by the renewal of our mind so that we know God's will for us. 

Comment and discuss this post.

My Prayer: Father God, You are an awesome God who loves and is always there with Your Word, the Holy Spirit, brothers and sisters in Christ and more to help us to be firm and from falling prey to the patterns of this world.  Thank You Jesus for the full armor of God.  I am not deserving of how richly You save and bless!  My sin is great and it continues...daily.  Please forgive me and help me overcome and turn from my sin towards You.  Help me love You with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love others as You love me.  Help me grow in my faith.  Give Lisa and myself wisdom and strength.  Please continue to heal Lisa of her cancer and from the side effects of chemo.  Help us lead Zach and Dustin to You Jesus and for them to choose You as their Lord and Savior.  Please provide Godly friends and spouses to Zach and Dustin.  Help me serve You, my family, my church, and others.  Help me understand, be obedient to, and apply Your message for me today and every day. 

Because the LORD was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking?Godly offspring.

Malachi 2:10-16

Because the LORD was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking?Godly offspring. Malachi 2:14-15

I continue my study of the last four books of the OT using the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary volume for this book as my focus remains Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament. Today my focus is a commentary-assisted review of Malachi 2:10-16.  Commentary outlines this text with the following divisions:

1. Covenant Infidelity Manifested by Israel’s Faithlessness to One Another (2:10): God first admonishes Israel for its poor treatment of one another - disobedience to the 2nd greatest commandment to love others (as God has loved us - John 13:34).
   
2. Covenant Infidelity Manifested by Israel’s Faithlessness to the Precepts of God (2:11-12): Next, God calls us Israel for their specific sins relating to their relationship with Him, including how "they have profaned the Lord through theft, murder, adultery, and deceit. Worst of all, they have chased after false gods—the ultimate betrayal of their covenantal relationship with Him.... They apparently ignored the precepts of God for personal profit and intermarried with pagan women after divorcing the wives of their youth. God strictly forbade these actions in the OT, but not because He discriminated against ethnic groups. The issue is not racial exclusivity. It is an issue of inclusivity and protection of His covenant people from idolatry (see also Deuteronomy 7:3)....The problem with marrying someone who is an unbeliever isn’t merely that they belong to a different religious organization. The problem with marrying an unbeliever is the different worldview through which they view all things. They perceive the world differently than a believer does. Christians have a certain system, a lens through which they view the world. An unbeliever does not look through that same lens."  We are reminded that God does not seek watered down obedience - or partial obedience.
   
3. Covenant Infidelity Manifested by Israel’s Faithlessness to Their Marriage Partners (2:13-14): We are referred to multiple texts on God's design for marriage, including Mark 10:6-9 (where Jesus refers to Genesis 2).  God clearly was disappointed in Israel towards the husbands who divorced their wives and married pagan women. We are reminded that the marriage covenant is reflection of the covenant between God and His children.  God hates divorce.
   
4. Covenant Renewal Begins with Faithfulness to the Covenant of Marriage (2:15-16): We are exhorted to follow the precepts of God - to make God the most important relationship then to love others as God loved us.  Through our vertical relationship to the Father we can maintain healthy horizontal relationships with others. See also this post from John Piper on DesiringGod.com.
   

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My Prayer: Father God, You are an awesome God who gives me the example of love and how You love me.  Thank You Jesus!  I am not deserving of how You love me.  My sin is great and it continues...daily.  Please forgive me Jesus and help me overcome and turn from my sin towards You.  Help me love You with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love others as You love me.  Help me grow in my faith.  Give Lisa and myself wisdom and strength.  Please continue to heal Lisa of her cancer and from the side effects of chemo.  Help us lead Zach and Dustin to You Jesus and for them to choose You as their Lord and Savior.  Please provide Godly friends and spouses to Zach and Dustin.  Help me serve You, my family, my church, and others.  Help me understand, be obedient to, and apply Your message for me today and every day.

Because the LORD was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking?Godly offspring.

Malachi 2:10-16

Because the LORD was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking?Godly offspring. Malachi 2:14-15

I continue my study of the last four books of the OT using the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary volume for this book as my focus remains Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament. Today my focus is an unassisted review of Malachi 2:10-16.  Here, God's message delivered through Malachi is directed towards God's people who have aligned themselves with those who worship foreign gods, and in particular the husbands who have been unfaithful to their wives, of course leading to offspring who are not trained in the ways of the Lord.  Vv10-12 describe Judah's faithlessness towards one another by marrying those who worship foreign gods.  Of course such deeds are prone to lead to adopting the worship of foreign gods, which then leads to faithlessness within the marriage and faithless children in such marriages.  VV14-15 share how God sought His people to be faithful to the marriage covenant He created (see also this post from DesiringGod.com).  V16a then describes how these marriages play out, more likely than not in divorce which the text describes as "cover[ing] garment[s] with violence."  V16b offers an antidote: "guard yourselves in your spirit, and do not be faithless."  We can of course guard ourselves in our spirit through practices of spiritual disciplines such as study of God's Word, prayer, worship, etc. Ephesians 6:10-20 also shares the "whole armor of God."

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My Prayer: Father God, You are an awesome God who guards my heart and Spirit - thank You Father God for providing Your Son, the Holy Spirit, Your Word, and so much more that offers not just salvation, but protection, refuge, direction, provision, etc.  I am not deserving of such blessings.  My sin is great and it continues...daily.  Please forgive me Jesus and help me turn from and overcome such sin and turn towards You.  Help me love You with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love others as You love me.  Help me grow in my faith.  Give Lisa and myself wisdom and strength. Please continue to heal Lisa of her cancer and from the side effects of chemo.  Help us lead Zach and Dustin to You Jesus and for them to choose You as their Lord and Savior.  Please provide Godly friends and spouses to Zach and Dustin.  Help me serve You, my family, my church, and others.  Help me understand, be obedient to, and apply Your message for me today and every day.