Believing in HIs Name

 

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MARK
BELIEVING IN HIS NAME

Mark 16:9-20

When Jesus rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had driven seven demons. 10 She went and told those who had been with him and who were mourning and weeping. 11 When they heard that Jesus was alive and that she had seen him, they did not believe it. 12 Afterward Jesus appeared in a different form to two of them while they were walking in the country. 13 These returned and reported it to the rest; but they did not believe them either. 14 Later Jesus appeared to the Eleven as they were eating; he rebuked them for their lack of faith and their stubborn refusal to believe those who had seen him after he had risen. 15 He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. 16 Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. 17 And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; 18 they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well."  19 After the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, he was taken up into heaven and he sat at the right hand of God. 20 Then the disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them and confirmed his word by the signs that accompanied it.

NIV

We have notes that comment regarding this last verse of Mark. It is noted that some of the oldest manuscripts do not have these verses, which means they were either added by some scribe or left off some of those older manuscripts for whatever reason. However, they do appear in many of the newer versions or translations of the New Testament. They are a shorter version of what other gospel accounts record of events that occurred after the resurrection of Jesus. This fits very well with the rest of this gospel according to Mark as he is a whole lot briefer than any of the others. This would or could indicate that Mark did not copy others, but did give his first-hand account of what he knew to be true. This is not to say the others did not have firsthand knowledge, but there has been some question about this ending of Mark. Nevertheless, the truth is still the same. Jesus spent time with various people, mostly his disciples, but also he appeared to many, assuring them all he said was true and that he was indeed alive. This commission of his disciples has significant meaning as if it were not for them following his commands, we would not have known about Jesus. Sure, we would still have all the Old Testament, but maybe that would have been kept to the Jewish people themselves and they would have felt no need to share those writings with gentiles. But now, we have all these writings that were inspired, just as the writings of the Old Testament, and give us a wonderful record of the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus, bringing us the hope of eternal life. We are so thankful that Jesus inspired these men, through the power of the Holy Spirit to go into all the world and preach this gospel. We have also taken his command and men and women have picked up that mantel of spreading the gospel message throughout the world. This message is still in the process of being spread, as there are still people who have not heard this message. There are some people who have heard it, and may have accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior, but have not completely grasped the whole of his message. Who of us has ever driven out a demon? We could say that we have, in one sense when we worked at Teen Challenge in Chicago, as we were involved in several cases of men who were possessed and had the demon leave them. We could also say, in some sense, that we exercised our own demons through the power of the Spirit. We can also say that we have spoken in new tongues. This is controversial in some sense, as some denominations, being considered as Pentecostal, believe the gifts of tongues still exist and practice speaking in this new tongue which they are not learned in, but rather speak through the inspiration of the Spirit, like the disciples did on that Day of Pentecost. There is another sense of a new tongue in that before salvation we spoke words or the world and considered not about God. But now our language is new as we speak not like the world, but we speak of the things of God. Yet, we have experienced both new languages. As far as the snakes, we cannot be certain we have ever handled such a thing. However, in some sense, Satan, the great serpent has been handled. We have cast him out and told him to get behind us. So we have picked up that snake and have thrown him asunder. We cannot say we have ever drunk poison and lived, however in some sense many of our daily intake of food and drink may poison our bodies, but we continue to live, and that is contributed to the power of the Spirit. This idea of placing our hands on sick people and they're being healed is a practice we believe in, but how many of us actually do this? Maybe we need to reassess just how much we believe Jesus. Maybe we just believe all this was just for those twelve and not for the rest of us, yet we want to go into all the world. We spent much time and effort along with money in the spreading of the gospel, funding those who say that have been called to the mission field. So why do we do that and not the rest of what Jesus told them would be the signs of those who believe in his name.