Mark Chapter 14
Read 1 . The feast of unleavened bread was one day within the feast of Passover . At Passover, the Jews remembered that Moses had led them out of Egypt around 1400 B C . The word Passover is used, because the angel of death ” passed over ” the houses of the Jews at that time without hurting them . Through Moses, God saved his people. That is the greatest story of the Old Testament. God chose this time for Jesus to die, to compare God’s saving through Jesus with God’s saving through Moses. What God did through Jesus was even greater than what Moses did. Since then, believers have celebrated what Jesus did at this time of the year rather than what Moses did. The significance of the bread was that the Jews did not have time to put yeast in their bread before they ran away from Egypt,
so every year at this time theJews ate bread that did not have any yeast. They broke one piece of bread, put it between two others, and said ” This shows us that when our king comes, his body will be broken for us ( that is, he will suffer and die for us ) . When Jesus celebrated the Passover feast with his disciples, He broke the bread, and said ” this is my body ” , so they would know that He is the king that they were waiting for .
Read 2 . The Jewish leaders were afraid that the common people would kill them if they tried to arrest Jesus.
Read 3 . Bethany is a small town near Jerusalem where some of Jesus’ friends lived. The expensive perfume was made from a spice that comes from India, which was usually imported in a jar made of stone such as the kind you can find in a cave. You must braek the jar so that the perfume will come out . It was a common custom to put oil on the head of a guest at a feast . Because this perfume is very expensive, we know the woman loved Jesus very much .
Read 4 through 6 . Some thought pouring this perfume was a waste of money, but Jesus said it was O K . Jesus knew that the motive of the woman was love , and Jesus accepted that it was proper for her to show her love for him in this way .
Read 7 . We are responsible both to take care of the poor and to worship Jesus .
Read 8 . In Jewish custom , it was common to put oil on the dead body before burying it . But oil was not put on criminals , and Jesus was going to die as a criminal .That’s why he used the word ” beforehand ” . He would not have the oil later , but because he is the king , it was proper for him to have the oil , so he accepted this perfume as his burial oil .
Read 9 . This sentence was fulfilled because Mark included the story in his gospel .
Read 10 – 11 . Because the Jewish leaders were afraid to arrest Jesus in public , they needed to find out where he went at night so that they then could go there and arrest him in secret . But they did not know where Jesus went at night . Judas promised to tell them .
Read 12 . Every year at Passover time , the Jewish people got together to eat a feast . One of the things they ate was lamb meat . The reason was that when Moses led the Jews out of Egypt , each family also put the lamb’s blood on their door-frames . When the angel of death came , the angel ” passed over ” the houses that had blood on the door , and did not hurt the Jes who were living inside . Because of the blood , they were saved . Jesus died at Passover time to make it clear that his purpose was also to save people through blood, that is, through his death . For this reason, the Bible compares Jesus to the lamb that is killed . John 1 : 29 calls Jesus the ” lamb of God ” .
Read 13 through 16 . This example shows that Jesus can foretell the future .
Read 17 through 20 . Jesus knew that Judas will give away the secret about where they were staying . The last sentence makes us realize how terrible it is that a close friend who ate Jesus would cooperate with Jesus’ enemies .
Read 21 . The Son of Man means Jesus . The old Testament prophesied that the king ( Jesus ) will be killed ( see Isaiah 53 : 4 – 7 ) . The Old Testament also prophesied that one of the king’s friends would betray him ( Psalm 41 : 9 ) . But he is still responsible for his own sin .
Read 22 . ” Gave thanks ” means that Jesus said the power of thanksgiving which Jews usually said during the Passover fearst . Breaking bread was one of the customs at this feast , which was a prophecy to the Jews that the king they are waiting for will die . When Jesus said ” this is my body ” , he revealed that he is the king .
Read 23 to 24 . It was also a custom to drink a cup of wine during the Passover feast . There was a special prayer of thanksgiving about the wine . Jesus had a very special meaning when he called the wine ”
Read 23 to 24 .It was also a custom to drink a cup of wine during the Passover feast . There was a special prayer of thanksgiving about the wine . Jesus had a very special meaning when he called the wine ” blood ” and said that it was about the ” covenant ” . ” Covenant ” means the promise God made to Abraham in Genesis 17 : 7 , to be God to Abraham’s descendants . God renewed this covenant many times ; one example was when Moses gave the ten commandments to God’s people. According to ancient custom, there must be blood to guarantee that the people in a covenant will keep their promises ( see Hebrews 9 : 18 – 19 ) . Jesus’ blood is the guarantee that God will keep His promises to us ( see Hebrews 9 : 13 to 15 ) . Jesus told believers to share the bread and wine with this meaning with each other often ( during Holy Communion , when Christians eat the body of Christ in the form opf the bread, they take part in the salvation that Christ brought about for them through His death, and when the Christians drink the blood of Christ in the form of the wine, they take part in the covenant, that is, God is our God. All who believe in Jesus are part of this covenant ( see Galatians 3 : 14 and 21 ).
Read 25 . This is the last feast Jesus will eat until he ears with us in the future in Heaven. This feast is described in Revelation 19 : 9 .
Read 26 . The Mount of Olives is a hill near Jerusalem . It has many olive trees .
Read 27 . Here Jesus quotes the Old Testament ( part of Zechariah 13 : 7 ) to foretell that when He is arrested,
the disdciples will run away . It came true in verse 50, below .
Read 28 . Here Jesus foretells that he will rise from the dead . Jesus said he would see them in Galilee : this event came true, and is written in John 21 : 1 .
Read 29 to 31 . Peter was very proud . In Mark 14 : 69 – 72 , we see that the words of Jesus came true .
Read 33 and 34 . Jesus told three disciples that he was very sad, and he wanted them to be near him to comfort him.
Read 35 . Jesus knew that soon he would be nailed to the cross . He asked if there could be another way for him to save people.
Read 36 . Abba means father . This word is used to show the relationship is very close and loving . ” The cup ” means the sufferings . Jesus’ will is not different from God the Father’s will.
Read 37 and 38 > We have the same problem as Peter and John . We are willing, but we allow our physcal needs to control us.
Read 39 to 42 . Because Jesus is God, He knows the future . He knew that he would now be arrested, and soon killed.
Read 43 to 46 . The crowd did not know what Jesus liiked like, so they had to wait until Judas kissed Jesus. The crowd was sent by the Jewish leaders.
Read 47 . For more details : John 18 : 10 tells who cut the slave’s ear . Luke 22 : 51 tells about Jesus’ reaction .
Read 48 to 50 . The Old Testament wrote that the Messiah’s friends would all run away . See verse 27 , above , for details .
Read 51 and 52 . Since this detail does not have any deep meaning, therefore it helps to prove that this story is really history, because someone saw this event and remembered .
Read 53 to 56 . The Jewish leaders met two times . The first meeting was at night . This was not legal, and so it was informal. The second meeting was in the morning ( Mark 15 : 1 ) . The leaders already had decided that they wanted to kill Jesus . They just needed some excuse. But no one could say anything bad about Jesus .
Read 53 to 56 . The Jewish leaders met two times . The first meeting was at night. This was not legal, so it was informal. The second meeting was in the morning ( Mark 15 ! ) . The leaders already had decided that they wanted to kill Jesus . They just needed some excuse . But no one could say anything bad about Jesus.
Read 57 to 59 . It is true that Jesus talked about building a temple in three days, but he was not talking about the temple in Jerusalem. The details are in John 2 : 28 to 22 . The reason that the Jews would be angry if Jesus said something bad about the temple is that the temple was very important to the Jews . They thought that having the temple proved that they were God’s special friends. Speaking against the temple was just as bad as saying that the Jews did not have a special relationship to God .
Read 60 and 61 . The Old Testament prophesied that the Messiah would keep silent : see Isaiah 52 : 7 . It is very interesting that the Hight Priest knew that the Messiah would be the Son of God . He knew it because Psalm 2 talks about the messiah in verse 2 , and in verse 7 says that the Messiah is God’s Son.
Read 62. This is the first time that Jesus openly said that He was the Messiah and the Son of God . In the next sentence, he shows us that the Son of Man also refers to Messiah. Because Jesus mentions the detail about the clouds, we know that Jesus meant to say that
He was the supernatural figure that Daniel 7 : 13 – 14 calls the ” Son of Man ” . Jesus said ” you will see ” , because Jesus will judge everyone at the end of the world ( see Matthew 35 : 31 – 32 ) . Now the High Priest was very angry, because he thought he had the right to judge Jesus, yet Jesus said that in the future Jesus would judge the High Priest .
Read 63 and 64 . The crime Jesus did was that He said He was God. The Old Testament clearly says that God is the judge ( for example , see Psalm 75 : 7 and 96 : 13 ) . When Jesus said he is the judge, that was the same as saying that he is God . More detail is in John 5 : 22 – 23 .
Read 65 . The soldiers did not believe that Jesus was God . They thought they could prove they were right by forcing Jesus to tell who hit him . Jesus did not play along with this game.
Read 66 to 72 . The words which Jesus said in Mark 14 : 30 came true here . Through this action, Peter realized that he had been too proud. Years later, Peter advised people to be careful about pride ( in I Peter 5 : 5 ) .
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