Aug. 04, 2024

We pick up in Chapter 2 verse 18 We see controversies over fasting, the illustration of new and old wineskins and Jesus and the Disciples are accused of breaking the Sabbath.

Mark Lesson 4 Study Questions

1.    Can the friends of the bridegroom fast while the bridegroom is with them? By using the illustration of a wedding (the bridegroom), Jesus drew on a powerful picture among the Jews. During the _________ wedding celebration, rabbis declared that ____ was more important than __________ religious rituals.

2.    The days will come… they will fast in those days: Jesus knew His ________, immediate presence would not always be with the disciples. When He was physically gone, it would be more ____________ to fast.

3.    New wine must be put into new wineskins: Jesus’ point was made clear by these examples. You can’t fit His new life into the old forms. Jesus traded fasting for feasting; sackcloth and ashes for a robe of righteousness; a spirit of heaviness for a garment of praise; mourning for ____; and law for _______.

4.    Look, why do they do what is not lawful on the Sabbath? Jesus never violated God’s command to observe the _________ or approved of His disciples violating God’s command to observe the Sabbath. But He often broke man’s legalistic _________ to that law, and He sometimes seemed to ___________ break them.

5.    Have you never read what David did: In referring to David’s use of the “holy bread” in 1 Samuel 21:1-6, Jesus showed an important principle – human ______ is more important than religious _______. The Sabbath was meant to serve man, not Sabbath for man.

6.    They watched Him closely, whether He would heal him on the Sabbath: The critics of Jesus ________ Him to heal this man with the withered hand. By their expectation, they admitted that Jesus had the power of God to work miracles. 

7.    Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill? In His question to the religious leaders, Jesus emphasized the _______ about the Sabbath: there is never a _______ day to do something truly good.

8.    Stretch out your hand: In this, Jesus commanded the man with the withered hand to do something impossible – to move his paralyzed hand. But as the man put forth ______, God did the _____. God never commands us without enabling us.

9.    Jerusalem… Idumea… beyond the Jordan… Tyre and Sidon: It is wonderful for people to be attracted to Jesus. But if their focus is on what He can ___ for them instead of _____ He is, they will not follow Him for long.

10.    He called to Him: A disciple was a student, but not in a classroom and _______ sense. A disciple learned by being with and hearing from his _______. A disciple was an __________ and learned from the master firsthand.

11.    He might send them out to preach, and to have power to heal sicknesses and to cast out demons: When someone has been with Jesus, and is sent out to _______ Him, they can expect that Jesus will give them the _______ to serve Him, including the power to see miraculous works (heal sicknesses and to cast out demons) done in their midst.

12.     “Judas’s surname of Iscariot probably indicates that he was a man from Kerioth: he thus seems to have been the only _______ among the twelve.” (Geldenhuys)