" And what was the end goal of his service to man? To die on the cross and release all from their many sins and grant forgiveness to them through His own death. To believe that -- that Christ died on the cross for us and arose again to sit on his throne -- is to be His disciple. And that was the service that Christ performed. And that leads us directly to Verse 10:45 as the core of this Gospel. With Mark's purpose in mind, as we have discussed, there could be no more key verse in his writings than this one.
It is fascinating that Mark chose to conclude his Gospel with the story of Bartimaeus, the blind man, who cries out to Jesus: "Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me!"(v.47). The title he gives to Jesus, "Son of David" immediately proclaims Jesus as who he really is, and all this from a blind man, who evidently sees Jesus for his real identity more clearly than the disciples or the crowd, or, for that matter, many of us today. Those with Him, who have witnessed Jesus' power and miracles, do not have the faith of the blind man who can't see anything. This is exactly the faith Mark is calling upon all Christians for -- the belief that Jesus came only to serve the many, and that service -- to give his life for our sins -- and our own faith in that fact, as the blind man had, makes us His disciples (Karris, p. 925).
Most scholars agree that Mark's primary source of information about Jesus was Peter -- the one Jesus loved. Some would even say that Mark's Gospel is simply his version of Peter's personal testimony. Due to the fast pace of it, the prominence of Peter in the text, and its similarity to Peter's writings, this view seems relevant and possible.
All of this lends credence, of course, to what Mark has to say and the urgency with which he says it. Peter, after all, was as close to Jesus as any of the disciples could hope to be. His knowledge of the humanness of Christ and his ministry was, most probably, unprecedented. For that reason, Mark's Gospel has been labeled by many Bible scholars as the most dynamic book in the Bible (Carter).
The book was written around the time of the fall of Jerusalem -- when Christian communities were suffering severe persecution. When Jerusalem fell, it destroyed the Jews' identity and their confidence in what they believed. So, at a time when the community needed hope, Mark chose to provide it. Turn to Him, Mark said, and here's why. And it also explains why he "cut out the fluff" and got right to the ministry of Jesus. This Gospel is Christ in action.
Christ is presented as miracle worker and servant. Much of Mark's urgency is aimed at describing the disciples themselves, who demonstrated clearly that they just didn't get it when it came to true faith in who Jesus was. They so lacked commitment that they abandoned him during his dire time of need in the Garden of Gethsemane (Carter). They truly didn't get it until Christ died on the cross for them and arose again to appear before them -- his work for them as their servant to forgive their sins and make them believe, thus, finally, becoming true disciples at the Pentecost and going forth and preaching the Good News. Once, again, we point to verse 10:45 as the key verse as it applied to the original disciples. This band of "keystone cops" as some scholars describe the 12 disciples became pillars of the faith with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and dedicated...
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