Hi everyone, welcome back to the Logical Bible Study podcast
where we take a look at the gospel reading from today's
Mass. And I want to give a shout out
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OK, so today we're looking at Mark chapter 6, verse 7 to 13.
Jesus made a tour around the villages teaching.
Then he summoned the 12 and began to send them off in pairs,
giving them authority over the unclean spirits.
And he instructed them to take nothing for the journey except a
staff. No bread, no haversack, no
coppers for their purses. They were to wear sandals, but,
he added, do not take a spare tunic.
And he said to them, if you enter a house anywhere, stay
there until you leave the district.
And if any place does not welcome you and people refuse to
listen to you as you walk away, shake off the dust from under
your feet as a sign to them. So they set off to preach
repentance and they cast out many devils and anointed many
sick people with oil and cured them.
So let's start at the start here.
Verse six says Jesus made a tour around the villages.
So we're still talking in the region of Galilee.
By the way, Jesus hasn't gone to Jerusalem or even the area
around Jerusalem yet. He's just stayed in the Galilee
region with although he's had a brief journey across the Sea of
Galilee to Gentile territory, but he's stayed in that northern
part of Israel. Now verse seven, he summons the
12. So the 12 that were listed
earlier in the Gospel of Mark he, he's already chosen his 12
apostles and now he's going to call them aside for a special
mission. So the 12 have now finished
their initial training and he's about to give them specific
instructions for how they should carry out their first
independent mission. So we're about to hear Jesus
give them instructions for their mission.
Remember that earlier in Mark, Mark tells us what the function
of the apostles was. One of them was to be with
Jesus, but then another one was to be sent out.
And so the word for sent out is actually apostello, apostello.
So that's where we get the word apostle from.
So the apostles are about to truly become apostles because
they're about to be sent out. Now, I want to emphasise what
we're about to hear are not instructions for all Christians
for all time. He's giving the 12A specific
mission here with specific instructions, so it doesn't all
necessarily apply to us in the same way that it did then.
So he sends them out in pairs, and there's a lot that could be
sent about the significance of pairs.
Probably the most obvious reason why he doesn't send them out as
individuals is because going out as an individual can be
dangerous for one. And also if you've got the
support of another person, you're likely to avoid
discouragement and temptation. So Jesus wants everyone to go
with a companion. And also you think about why not
and have groups of three or four.
Well, they can cover more ground if they split up into more
groups. So you could say that in Jesus
thinking at this point, the ideal number to have in a group
is 2 or to have leading a group. There might be other disciples
with them, but it's certainly the apostles that are being sent
out here. There could also be an element
of establishing a matter by two witnesses.
Remember, in the Old Testament, the principle is always if you
want to prove something, you need to have two witnesses.
So that could be in view here as well.
The actual Greek text here where he sends them out actually says
more literally, he began to send them out in pairs.
So that might suggest that he's actually calling them, not he's
sending them at different times. He's calling aside two of them,
giving them specific instructions, sending them out.
So he could actually be spending quality time with each pair
before he sends them out here, which is actually really cool to
think about. And he gives them authority over
the unclean spirits. So notice here, Jesus imparts
his own authority to the apostles so that they can carry
out exorcisms. This is their main goal of this
part of their ministry. He doesn't say go perform
miracles, cure all the sick. Actually here he just gives them
the authority to cast out demons.
So it seems like that's their main thing to do at this point,
which would echo something that was said earlier in Mark.
Remember with the parable of the strong man, He said that first
the strong man must be bound. And certainly these exorcisms
that Jesus is doing all over Galilee is Satan being slowly
bound, his power being reduced. So then Jesus can quote plunder
his goods, as in bring the people that are in the Kingdom
of Satan into the Kingdom of God.
So that's probably what's going on here.
There's a lot of exorcisms in the early stages of the
ministry. Now notice it's not by their own
power that they can do ministry. Jesus has to impart his own
authority first. He says some verse 8, take
nothing for the journey. So we'll talk a bit about what's
going on here. Why does he say don't take
anything? The first thing to keep in mind,
though, is that this would be a short journey to the towns
surrounding Galilee. So each journey was probably
only a few weeks long, he says. But you can take a staff, so as
in like a stick to help with walking on the uneven roads.
He says don't take any bread. So he wants them to learn to
rely on the hospitality of others, genuine hospitality of
others, rather than taking their own bread.
But then he says no Haversack or another translation is no bag.
So Jesus says they can't even take a bad bag to accept goods
from other people on their journey.
If people say, you know, take some bread for your journey,
thank you for coming, have some bread, they have to say no,
that's Jesus instruction here. And also no money.
So he doesn't want them to be concerned with worldly goods.
So they're literally just taking the clothes on their back and a
stick and that's about it. So why does Jesus want them to
have poverty on this particular journey?
It's because probably he wants them to trust in God.
Probably also it could be trying to show the villagers that
they're visiting that they're genuine and they're not
preaching out of like a worldly gain kind of thing.
So they're actually genuine. And Peter learned from this
experience because later in Acts chapter 3, Peter would say, he
says, I have neither silver nor gold, but what I do have I give
you in the name of Jesus Christ, the Nazarene walk.
So Jesus at this stage wants them to live in poverty and just
accept the hospitality and the food from other people.
Verse 9 But he does say they were to wear sandals.
So rather than bare feet. And so the implication here is
Jesus at least allows them to have the basic necessities.
He's not going to make them go without sandals.
So it's not supposed to be a complete mortification type
trip. They're allowed to have the
necessities, but he then qualifies it by saying do not
take a spare tunic. So again, they can take the
absolute necessities but nothing extra.
So this will be a challenge. These are the apostles have
never done this before. Some of them come from quite
wealthy families. James and John were quite
wealthy fishermen, so quite an experience for them.
Verse 10, Jesus goes on, he says if you enter a house now this is
not we shouldn't think of this as door to door evangelising as
in the apostles knocked on people's doors and said, can I
preach the gospel to you? No, What they would have done is
they've gone out into public squares and preached the gospel
that way. But when he says if you enter a
house, he means if someone invites you into their house,
which is what the Jews would do in those in that culture, if
they liked the message they were hearing from the apostles, a
local could invite them to stay. He says stay there in that house
until you leave the district. So Jesus says you need to be
content with whatever house you find yourself in and don't be
unnecessarily distracted by trying to find a better house.
Verse 11 And if any place does not welcome you and people
refuse to listen to you. So here Jesus means if any town,
little village as a whole rejects you, if you don't get a
good response in a town, then he's going to go on to tell them
what to do. But before we look at that, it's
worth emphasising something Jesus says later in the Gospel
of Mark. He says to the apostles, he who
hears you hears me. So the principle Jesus sets up,
his people's response to the apostles is actually their
response to Jesus. He's given the apostles his
authority. They can go in his name.
And therefore, if they reject the legitimate messengers of
Jesus, then they reject Jesus. And in fact, that's obviously
taken up in Catholic teaching because the Catholic teaching is
similar about the magisterium of the Church.
If you reject the magisterium of the Church, you are in a sense
rejecting the legitimate authority that Jesus has set up.
So with that background, he says if you go into a town and they
refuse to listen to you as you walk away, shake off the dust
from under your feet as a sign to them or another translation
is as a testimony against them. So what's going on here?
Shaking the dust off your feet? So first thing to say is the
Jews considered dust to be holy in a sense.
And so in this culture, actually, if a Jew came back
from Gentile territory and came back to Israel, they would
literally shake the dust off their feet.
They would shake that Gentile dust off their feet as they re
entered their home country of Israel to to show disapproval of
the impurity of the Gentiles. So shaking the dust off their
feet, it could be a visible thing, as in people could see
them shaking the dust off. That would make sense because
that would make it a visible sign against them.
And so basically it's a symbolic gesture of repudiation if you
shake the dust off your feet. It's a Jewish way of saying we
do not approve of this place and that that's quite serious.
If the apostles end up in a place where that happens, it
basically means that place has rejected Jesus invitation to the
Kingdom of God and they've forfeited their salvation, at
least on a on a town level. Presumably that happened in some
towns, although we don't have a list of towns or anything like
that at this stage. Verse 12.
So they set off to preach repentance.
So off they go. Now notice what they're
preaching here. It's not God loves you, it's
repent. If you want to enter the
Kingdom, repent. And the Greek word is metanoia.
That's Jesus constant condition. If you want to enter the Kingdom
you need to repent as in stop sinning, turn around and follow
the will of God. Verse 13.
So they're in the villages and it says they cast out many
demons with the authority that Jesus has given them.
And remember, demons being exercised is a sign that the
Kingdom of God is overcoming the Kingdom of Satan.
So every time a demon is exercised in these early days,
Satan feels the loss. He's losing his territory very
quickly as these apostles spread out and spread the Kingdom.
Then they do something else which is unexpected.
They anointed many sick people with oil.
So here we have an example of sacramentality.
God chooses to use physical things to bring healing to
people. And here the apostles, probably
based on Jesus instructions, when there's a sick person, they
don't just say a magic word or put their hands on them even.
They actually use oil as part of the healing.
And so this passage, as well as some others later in the book of
James, become the basis for the Catholic teaching on the
sacrament of the anointing of the sick.
So it's really interesting. Even here they're using oil,
which was in Jewish religious ceremonies, it was used a lot.
It was considered to representative life and
vitality, and it was used to impart blessings and healing.
So oil was a Jewish ritual and a a Jewish thing.
And the early Christian community here basically puts
its stamp of approval on using oil to heal people, and that
later becomes the sacrament of the anointing of the sick.
There's a few catechism passages here that are worth looking at.
So how does the Catholic Church develop teachings based on what
we've heard here in Mark 6? So there's some passages about
exorcisms, and I'll include those in the show notes, but
there's a couple of other ones here that are worth reading.
So paragraph 1506, which is in the section about healing the
sick, you'll hear it quotes directly from this passage.
Christ invites his disciples to follow him by taking up their
cross. In their turn, by following him,
they acquire a new outlook on illness and the sick.
Jesus associates with them his own life of poverty and service.
He makes them share in his ministry of compassion and
healing. So they went out and preached
that men should repent, and they cast out many demons and
anointed with oil many that were sick, and healed them.
So you'll hear paragraph 15-O6 there, quoting directly from
Mark chapter 6. And then in paragraph 1511, just
a few paragraphs later, there's a discussion there about the
anointing of the sick, the sacrament, and here's what it
says. The Church believes and
confesses that among the seven sacraments there is one
especially intended to strengthen those who are being
tried by illness, the anointing of the sick.
This sacred anointing of the sick was instituted by Christ
our Lord as a true and proper sacrament of the New Testament.
It is alluded to indeed by Mark, but it is recommended to the
faithful and promulgated by James the Apostle and brother of
the Lord. So there the Catechism quotes
from the Council of Trent. So the Council of Trent meant in
1500. And one of the things they
decided on was how many sacraments are there?
And the justification for the Council of Trent's decision to
include the anointing of the sick is a sacrament.
You'll hear there that the Council of Trent actually worked
out that the anointing of the sick is a sacrament based on
this passage in Mark. They actually say the early
stages that have found in this passage we've heard today from
Mark. So that's quite incredible.
The Council of Trent, which is a super important council,
developed it's teaching quite clearly from Mark chapter six
here, although it does go on to say in the Council of Trent, the
anointing of the sick is more clearly explained later in the
book of James. Thanks again for listening.
Hope you learned something new. And as I said, I'd love to hear
from you. Tell me how you found this
podcast. Tell me what you're learning and
if you have any questions. Thanks for listening.