The Two Stage Miracle – Mark 8:22-26

All right, so it's 932, so let's go to the Lord in prayer, and then we'll get started.

We're gonna be looking today at Mark chapter eight. Good morning, Kim. All right, let's pray.

Lord, we are very grateful for the blessing that we have this technology to be able to meet together, even if it is at a distance, and we're thankful that we know that your church is being built and that we know that we are your church, it's not a building.

We do look forward to being able to get together and meet again soon, if you are willing, and that we would be able to enjoy that fellowship and the singing of your word again.

These are the things that our hearts long for, and we long for that day to arrive and to come quickly. We pray that in the meantime, that this would satisfy our hunger and desire for fellowship and friendship, and we pray that your blessing might rest upon the teaching of your word today in both this

Sunday school hour, as well as the worship service to follow, or the second session to follow. May you be glorified through it.

Help me to be clear in what I'm teaching, and I pray that this may be something that would serve to benefit us and to encourage us greatly in your word, and that you would open our eyes to see in your word wonderful things.

We ask this in Christ's name, amen. All right, so we are in Mark chapter eight.

So if you have your copy of God's word, turn to Mark chapter eight, and we're gonna be looking at a kind of a perplexing, somewhat odd passage of scripture, or odd story in the gospel of Mark, and it's probably one that may have perplexed you at some point in the past, and maybe even caused you to wonder what exactly is going on here, and we're gonna work through that today.

So the reason I'm, well, let's read the passage first, and then I'll kind of go into why it is that I chose this passage for this morning.

So let's read verses 22, Mark chapter eight, verse 22, and we'll read through verse 26, and then, of course, in order to understand this, we're gonna be broadening our scope out to the context.

So Mark eight, verse 22. And they came to Bethsaida, and they brought a blind man to Jesus and implored him to touch him.

Taking the blind man by the hand, he brought him out of the village, and after spitting on his eyes and laying his hands on him, he asked him, do you see anything?

And he looked up and said, I see men, for I see them like trees walking around. Then again, he laid his hands on his eyes, and he looked intently and was restored and began to see everything clearly.

And he sent him to his home saying, do not even enter the village. And we're choosing this passage, not because Jesus spit on a man and we're in the midst of a quarantine for communicable viruses and stuff like that.

That's not the reason we're talking about this. I'm gonna ignore for the time being entirely the means of the healing.

What we're looking at today is why did this healing take two stages? Why did Jesus heal the man and then ask him the results of the miracle and then have to take a second shot at him and heal him a second time?

And this is, I'm wondering if this passage has ever perplexed you in that way, if you've ever read this and thought this is unique.

What's going on here? Why did Jesus have to take two shots at this? Because this is the only place in all of the

New Testament where there is a miracle like this. This is the only miracle like this in all of the gospels that Jesus did.

And in the book of Acts and the miracles that the apostles did, this is unique.

There's nothing like that in Acts either. What we normally see in miracles in the New Testament is a complete healing.

Like the man born blind in John chapter eight, or John chapter nine. He was healed instantly and it was complete.

He didn't go through a stage of healing. It didn't take him a long time to get his healing. The healings were complete and the healings were instant.

And it always worked the first time that Jesus healed him. It didn't take more than one attempt to do the miracle, to heal the person.

And so what we see here in this passage is really quite unique. It's entirely different than anything else that any other miracle that Jesus did.

Because there's a number of things that make it unique. Disregarding for a moment the spitting on his eyes, et cetera.

But notice that Jesus questions the man and asks the man if his action had been effective.

He says in verse 23, he asked him, do you see anything? Second, you'll notice that it was a partial healing.

The man was healed enough to see the men walking around like trees, but it obviously wasn't clear and it obviously didn't work entirely the first time.

So now the question is, what possible explanations are there for Jesus healing in this fashion?

So if this miracle has ever perplexed you, if this passage has ever perplexed you, or if you've ever been lured in by the charismatic explanation of this passage, which

I'll get to in just a second, looking at the context is I think gonna help to see why it is that Jesus healed in this way.

So what possible explanations are there for why Jesus healed this way? First, it could have been, and I don't think that any of these are the case, but I'm just throwing these out as things that have been suggested.

Could it have been a lack of faith on behalf of the blind man? That maybe the man didn't believe enough to receive a full healing?

Now charismatic teachers would say this, word of faith teachers would say this, that our healing or God's ability to work in and through our lives is dependent upon our faith.

And if you have greater faith, you get to see a greater miracle. If you have lesser faith, you get to see a lesser miracle. So they would say the man didn't have enough faith for the full healing the first time around, so Jesus was only able to give the man as much healing as the man had faith for.

That's one explanation. Second, it could have been a lack of power on Jesus' behalf. Like he had to take two runs at this miracle just to make sure that it got done correctly in the end.

So did he lack power? That's a second explanation that's been offered. A third one is that this was just an extraordinarily difficult healing.

Like this man was more blind than the man born blind in John chapter nine, so this healing was just a little bit more difficult and Jesus had to take a second shot at it, take a second run at it.

Or the charismatic explanation of the passage would be that Jesus was trying to show us that some healings take time and there's a process involved in the healing.

So if you ask a charismatic, for instance, why it is that the person can leave the healing meeting, yeah, not using their walker, but they're not exactly walking upright and jumping and skipping about with a complete healing.

They would say, well, some healings take time. You know, you receive your healing by faith at the meeting and then you go home and later on, a couple of weeks later, then the cancer goes away or the lupus goes away or the brain tumor goes away or whatever it is.

And so they would say some of these healings take time and it's a process, it's long and it's drawn out. And yet the pattern that we normally see in scripture, again, is complete healings, instant healings and organic healings.

Not people being healed of upset stomachs and a pain in their lower back and things like that, but like limbs being healed, the lame made to walk, eyes that could not see made to see, ears that, sorry, ears that could not hear, the deaf made to hear again.

Those are the type of organic, instant and complete healings that are characteristic all the way through the New Testament. Why in this one instance is there something different going on?

I think that this healing is an object lesson for the apostles. That's the, I'm giving you the reveal here at the beginning.

It's an object lesson for the apostles. And I wanna show you this. I've got a overhead here. So technology is our friend and I just need to click and put up the overhead.

Here we go. All right, here's our overhead. Now I want you to notice here that there is a pattern in the gospel of Mark.

You'll notice on that there's something that starts back in chapter six. Something that starts, hold on,

I gotta turn off the chat so that I can see what's going on with the overhead here. There we go. There's a pattern that starts back in chapter six of Mark's gospel.

And you'll notice that this pattern of events starting in chapter six goes all the way through to the end of chapter eight.

Now the miracle that we're talking about is chapter eight, 22 to 26. So here's the pattern.

There's the feeding of a multitude in chapter six. There's a second one in chapter eight. Then that's followed in each instance by a confession or the crossing of the sea and a landing.

And then that's followed with a conflict with the Pharisees and then a conversation about bread and then a healing and then a confession of faith.

That's the pattern starting in chapter six, verse 31. And it goes all the way through the end of chapter seven. And then the same pattern repeats itself later.

Click off the overhead. For those of you in the live studio audience, here's our overhead. We do have live studio audience again today.

So that's the pattern in the gospel of Mark starting back in chapter six, verse 31. So if you got your

Bibles and you're following along, go back to chapter six. I'm just gonna kind of give you a brief overview so you can kind of see the whole, so we can see the whole pattern and see a theme that emerges starting back in chapter six that culminates actually in chapter nine after our miracle.

But I want you to see how the theme is developed by Mark over these three, six, seven, eight, nine, almost four chapters that he's dealing with here.

And let me give you, well, no, I'll save that for the end. All right, so here's chapter six, verse 33.

Here's the feeding of the 5 ,000. So Jesus feeds the multitude in chapter six, beginning at verse 33, and you'll see it goes all the way through the end of verse 44.

Verse 45, immediately Jesus made his disciples get into a boat and go ahead on the other side to Bethsaida while he himself was sending the crowd away.

And after bidding them farewell, he left for the mountain to pray. So there's the crossing of the water again, and they land in Bethsaida.

Now, where did our miracle take place? In Bethsaida. So Mark is not forgetting the details and just simply repeating the pattern.

The pattern is here because these events are significant. So the feeding of the multitude, the 5 ,000, and then

Jesus crosses the water and lands in Bethsaida. Verse 47, there's another miracle where he comes to the disciples on the boat while they're out in the sea in the storm.

And he says, take courage, it's I do not be afraid. And then look at verse 52, verse 51 of chapter six.

Then he got into the boat with them and the wind stopped and they were utterly astonished. Now look at this, this is significant because this is the first mention of this.

Verse 52, for they had not gained any insight from the incident of the loaves, but their heart was hardened. Now what's

Mark doing? Mark is mentioning the loaves and he's saying that they, the disciples, had not gained any insight from the incident with the loaves.

The loaves should have taught the disciples something. They should have taught them that Jesus has control of all things.

He protects them, he provides for them. It's all under his sovereign control. He's master of all of these things. But they're out in the middle of the sea on a boat in a storm and they're upset and they're fearful and Jesus comes walking on the water.

They're still afraid. And Mark's commentary in verse 52 is they had not gained any insight from the incident with the loaves.

That the lesson of multiplying bread and fish for the multitudes just went right over their head.

They didn't catch it at all. Verse 53, when they crossed over, they came to the Gennesaret and moored on the shore and when they got out of the boat, immediately the people recognized him and ran about the whole country and began to carry here and there on their pallets those who were sick to the place that they already was.

Whenever he entered the villages or cities of the countryside, they were laying the sick in the marketplaces. So Jesus is healing them.

Then there was a confrontation with the Pharisees in chapter seven, verses one to 23.

This confrontation with the Pharisees has to deal with the commandments of men and their traditions. He deals with the heart issue beginning, you just kind of skim down through chapter seven, verse six, seven, eight, nine, 10.

He confronts them for their honoring their commandments of men over the word of God. Verse 14 of chapter seven, after he called the crowd to him again, he began saying to them, listen to me, all you who understand, there's nothing outside of the man which defiles him.

He's drawing here a lesson for the disciples about what defiles a man, whether it is what is external or what is internal and Jesus is dealing with the issue of the heart.

It is the heart, that which comes out of the heart that defiles a man. Verse 17, when he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples questioned him about the parable.

So he had given them the parable and his disciples questioned, they did not get it. They did not understand. Verse 18, and he said to them, are you so lacking in understanding also?

Do you not understand that whatever goes into the heart of man cannot defile him? And then he goes on to explain the parable, but what is

Jesus highlighting there with the disciples? You do not yet understand, right? They did not, they gained no insight from the incident with the loaves.

And then afterwards, they have to ask him about the meaning of the parable and they're still thick in the heart and head.

They still did not get it. So then we get to chapter eight. Oh, and then there's a miracle, sorry. The conversation about the bread is in chapter seven, verses 24 through 30.

There's the conversation about the woman, the Syrophoenician woman, where he says in verse 27, after she comes to him asking him to cast a demon out of her daughter, he says to her in verse 27, let the children be satisfied first, for it's not good to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.

And she answered and said to him, yes, Lord, but even the dogs under the table feed on the children's crumbs. And he said to her, because of this answer, go, the demon has gone out of your daughter.

So there's a brief conversation there and the subject matter of that conversation is bread. Then you get into chapter eight and this whole, so then there's the healing with the

Syrophoenician woman, before we get to chapter eight. There's the healing with the Syrophoenician woman in verses 24 through 30.

And then there is another miracle in verses 31 through 36. And then that is followed in verse 37 by a confession.

They were utterly astonished, saying he has done all things well. He makes even the deaf to hear and the mute to speak. So there is this confession of faith or understanding about who he is in verse 37.

So that's the pattern from 631, remember overhead again, 631 all the way through the end of chapter seven.

Now, interestingly, Mark repeats the exact same pattern again, beginning in chapter eight. In those days, there was again a large crowd and they had nothing to eat.

Jesus called his disciples and said to them, I feel compassion for the people, feed them. And then there's the feeding of 4 ,000 in chapter eight verses one through nine.

In chapter eight, verse 10, again, they immediately entered a boat with the disciples and came to the district of Dalmanutha.

The Pharisees came out. So there's the crossing of the land of the sea and landing.

Then there's a conflict with the Pharisees, verse 11. They came out and began to argue with him, seeking for him a sign from heaven to test him and sign deeply in his spirit.

He said, why does this generation seek for a sign? And truly, I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation. Leaving them, he again embarked and went to the other side.

Then he, after the conversation with the Pharisees, he leaves again with the disciples this time.

Now this, I need to stop and pause here for just a moment. This conflict with the Pharisees where Jesus says to them, no sign will be given to this generation and they ask for him a sign.

This is the only conflict with the Pharisees that I'm aware of, and I'm pretty sure this is true, that's mentioned in all four of the gospels where they ask him for a sign.

So it is significant, and Jesus doesn't give them a sign. It's this conflict with the Pharisees. He doesn't give them a sign.

He leaves with his disciples, beginning in verse 14, and they had forgotten to take bread.

So now there's a conversation about bread with them again, again, following our pattern, conversation with bread.

Before it was with the Syrophoenician woman regarding a miracle. Here they have another conversation with bread.

Now what is fresh on the minds of the disciples? Bread, they have seen him multiply bread twice.

They saw him multiply bread, then have a discussion with the Syrophoenician woman and entail bread.

Then they see him multiply bread and feed another multitude a second time, and now they've departed, and they departed without any bread.

So we find in verse 14, they had forgotten to take bread and did not have more than one loaf in the boat with them. And he was giving orders to them saying, watch out, beware of the leaven of the

Pharisees and the leaven of Herod. And they began to discuss with one another the fact that they had no bread.

Now, interesting that Jesus talks here, another conversation about bread. This time he mentions the leaven of the

Pharisees and of Herod. What is the leaven that Jesus has in mind here? Well, leaven is something that is unseen.

It's almost undetectable, but like Paul mentions in 1 Corinthians chapter five, I think it is, it permeates an entire loaf.

It has a way of spreading into the whole loaf of bread. A little leaven leavens the whole loaf. So what is the leaven of the

Pharisees? Do you remember at the end of Jesus's life, when he is on trial before Pilate and Pilate sends him away to Herod.

Why did Herod want to see Jesus? What had Herod asked for? Do you remember that? Herod wanted to see

Jesus because he was hoping to see a sign. That's what Herod's desire was. What had the Pharisees asked for?

A sign. They wanted a miracle. Herod wanted a miracle. Both the Pharisees and Herod remained in unbelief and demanded signs and miracles.

Now, what had Jesus just done for the disciples? Two miracles, plus the Syrophoenician woman. He had healed her.

And then after that, he made the lame to walk and the deaf to see, or the deaf here in verse 31 of chapter seven.

So Jesus has now performed four miracles in the sight of the disciples. After the first miracle of bread, they had learned nothing from the incident of the loaves.

And then when Jesus teaches them about this, they're still benighted. They don't understand the lesson of the parables.

And then they're out in the middle with the boat and they're tossed about. They don't get that. They're fearful then.

And then Jesus performed yet another miracle in multiplying food for the 4 ,000.

And then the Pharisees demand this sign. And what is the common theme in all of this with the disciples and the

Pharisees? It's the desire for a sign and remaining in unbelief. The disciples had seen the sign, but still remained hard -hearted, still remained ignorant, and the lessons of the signs had not been picked up by them at all.

They still did not understand. And so when Jesus talks about the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod, he's describing a hard heart of unbelief that demands signs.

Jesus had already given to them enough signs to believe, but they would not believe because signs do not make anybody believe.

I hope you understand that by now. Signs don't cause belief. Now, the reality is that with both

Herod and the Pharisees, the problem was not that they did not have enough signs because the problem is never a lack of evidence.

What is it? It's always a love for darkness. And so they would not believe no matter what sign Jesus had given to them.

So Jesus leaves the Pharisees standing on the seashore in verse 13 of chapter eight, gets into the boat with the disciples.

And I would have loved to have just been a fly on the side of the boat to hear that conversation amongst the disciples about whose responsibility it was to bring bread and who had forgotten to bring bread on the boat with them.

Now, Jesus has just multiplied bread and fish for the multitude. They get into the boat with one loaf, and now they're arguing about who was supposed to bring the bread and we don't have enough bread and we don't have enough for us.

Obviously, they did not learn the lesson from the loaves and the fishes the second time around either. They still didn't get it because if they had learned that lesson and believed as they should have, in the boat, they would have just handed

Jesus the one loaf that they had and said, hey, would you mind making 12 of these for us? And maybe pull some fish out of the sea and make 12 or 24 fish as well and we have enough to go around.

Just can you take what we have here and multiply it? If they had believed and understood his ability to do miracles, they would have believed him for that.

But now they're arguing in the boat about over who was supposed to bring the bread because they only had one loaf. And Jesus now takes the bread and uses it as an object lesson and says, beware of the

Pharisees, the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod, that leaven being unbelief.

And then Jesus in verse 17 exposes their unbelief and exposes their hardness of heart and exposes their spiritual blindness.

Look at verse 16. Then they began to discuss with one another the fact that they had no bread.

Again, they could have just handed him a loaf and said, can you make 12 of these? And they have seen him do it. They knew he could do it.

They saw him do it, but they did not get it. So then Jesus, aware of this, verse 17, said to them, why do you discuss the fact that you have no bread?

Do you have a hardened heart? Or sorry, no, first question. Do you not yet see or understand?

Do you have a hardened heart? Having eyes, do you not see? And having ears, do you not hear?

And do you not remember? When I broke the five loaves for the 5 ,000, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you pick up?

They said to him, 12. And when I broke the seven for the 4 ,000, how many full baskets of broken pieces did you pick up?

And they said to him, seven. And he was saying to them, do you not yet understand? Now, what is the theme all the way through from the first feeding of the multitude in chapter six?

What's the theme? The theme is that they did not perceive or understand the lesson from the feeding of the 5 ,000.

And then their hearts were hardened. And he says to them in chapter seven after that, are you lacking in understanding?

Do you not understand this? He's expecting them to understand based upon what they had seen.

They had seen the evidence. He expects them to understand. He's reproving them for their unbelief. Then they saw the miracle of Syrophoenician woman.

Then they saw the miracle of making the deaf to hear and to speak again. And then they saw him multiply the bread for the 4 ,000.

They get in the boat and they're arguing over a bread boat. So what does Jesus say to them? Look at the repeated questions that he asked them in verses 17 and 18.

Do you not yet see or understand? Do you have a hardened heart? Having eyes, do you not yet see? What is he reproving them for?

You still don't see it. And it doesn't mean physical sight. He's talking about their spiritual perception.

You still do not see the lesson. You're like the Pharisees with a hardened heart. You've seen the signs, but you do not believe.

You do not understand it. Now all of that, imagine having that conversation in the boat. He is reproving them for seeing the miracles twice, two miracles, and still remaining in unbelief.

And almost as soon as they get done with that conversation, the boat docks, and where are they at? Bethsaida, the same place that they landed after the first time he multiplied the bread and the fish.

They land back in Bethsaida, which is Peter's hometown. And then verse 22.

And they came to Bethsaida and they brought to him a blind man. And here's our miracle, the two -stage miracle. They brought him a blind man to Jesus and implored him to touch him.

Taking the blind man by the hand, he brought him out of the village. And after spitting on his eyes and laying his hands on him, he asked him, do you see anything?

And what did Jesus just say to the disciples in the boat? Moments before. Do you not see it? Do you not see it?

You don't see. As your heart hardened, you have eyes to see, but you do not see. And he's telling them they should have spiritually perceived these realities of who he was.

And they just weren't getting it in spite of seeing the signs. And so allow me some sanctified speculation.

When I read this miracle in this context, knowing all of his background, I can almost picture Jesus healing the man that is blind here, healing him partially, and then asking him, do you see?

He's doing a miracle. Do you see? There's, I think, a kind of a double entendre there where the question is directed not just at the blind man, but also at the disciples.

Here's a miracle. Do you see? And this is why Jesus asked him the effect of the miracle.

Does he see yet? But interestingly, the man does not see immediately. Instead, he sees partially.

So he says in verse 24, he looked up and said, I see men, for I see them like trees walking around. Now, the man begins to see, but it's obviously not a clear sight.

And by the way, how did he know what trees looked like? Is that something that he would have imagined in his mind because he had felt the trees before?

Or does this miracle in his statement indicate that maybe the man was not born blind, but maybe had become blind at some point in his life.

And he was at least familiar with what trees would have looked like. And so now he sees men, but it's not with clarity.

So he sees them just as these, just pillars without any details. He just sees the outline of these men.

And so they become to him like trees walking around. Verse 25, then again, he slayed his hands on his eyes and looked intently and was restored and began to see everything clearly.

So it's not that this man has been blind all his life and it was a complete healing and he didn't quite get what men should look like.

He thought they looked like trees. It's that this man was healed partially the first time. And then he was asked, do you see?

And he doesn't see everything clearly. And then he is, Jesus does the second phase of this and heals him fully the second time so that he is able to see clearly.

Now, what's happening here? Is it because Jesus didn't have enough power to heal the man?

Is it because the man didn't have enough faith to be healed? Is Jesus just trying to show us that some miracles take time and a process and we need to try multiple times to heal people.

If you have God's power to heal, then sometimes it can take several attempts to get it right. I don't think any of that is what's going on.

I think this whole miracle, it is unique because the whole miracle is intended as an object lesson to the disciples.

Look at what happens after the object lesson. And now remember, the healing of the, or the sorry, the feeding of the 5 ,000, they did not understand the meaning of the loaves and the fish.

They didn't get the significance of it. Jesus has chastised them for their inability to perceive the spiritual teaching of the parables.

Then they've seen miracle after miracle. They saw another miracle of healing or feeding the 4 ,000.

They still didn't get it. Get in the boat and they're arguing over bread. Jesus said, beware, your heart is hardened. Do you have eyes to see, but you don't see?

They get out of the boat. He grabs a man who was blind, heals him partway and asked him, do you see? And the whole theme of this is spiritual sight and physical sight.

He says to the disciples, you have physical eyes, but you do not spiritually perceive the truth of who I am and what

I've come to do. You don't spiritually perceive the significance of these events. So the man born blind is the whole conversation, the whole miracle has two meanings.

To the man born blind, Jesus is healing him, but he's doing it in such a way as to illustrate something to the disciples.

That is that they had seen these miracles, but still did not fully see. To them, they saw the miracles.

They saw the miracles that Jesus did, but to them, the significance was like men walking about as trees.

It was still blurry to them. They didn't understand any of the significance of it. And so Jesus heals the man fully and completely so that he perceives and sees everything clearly.

And then what's the very next thing that happens? Verse 27, Jesus went out along with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi, and on the way he questioned disciples saying, who do people say that I am?

Now, here's the test. Do you see it? Do you understand yet who I am, what I've come to do, what I claim to be, who

I claim to be, what I'm claimed to be able to do? Who do people say that I am? They said, well, John the

Baptist, and others say Elijah, and others one of the prophets, and he continued questioning, but who do you say that I am, right?

Do you see? That's the question now to the disciples. Do you spiritually perceive who I am?

And what does Peter say? This is his grand confession. Peter answered and said to him, you're the Christ. And he warned them not to tell anybody.

So the disciples go from partial sight to full sight, but it takes a long process and a couple of these miracles for them to get it.

All the while, Jesus is chastising them for their lack of full sight and lack of full understanding for who he is.

And the man born, the man, I can't say he's born blind because the text doesn't say that, but the man who was blind that Jesus heals in two phases, the question at the heart of that really is directed at the disciples.

Do you see? Do you see anything? That's what he's asking the man that was blind.

And what is his answer? Kind of. I kind of see, but I kind of don't. And then

Jesus heals him completely so that he sees clearly. And then what's the very next thing that happens? Peter's clear confession of faith.

You are the Christ. And Peter then got it. And then in chapter nine, chapter nine, verse one,

Jesus was saying to them, truly, I say to you, there are some who are standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God after it has come with power.

Six days later, it goes up on the Mount of Transfiguration and there they see clearly with their own physical eyes exactly who

Jesus is. The divine son, where Moses and Elijah are speaking with him and he hears the voice of the father saying, this is my beloved son in whom

I'm well pleased. There, Peter and James and John saw with full clarity with their physical eyes what they did not see before.

They heard clearly with their physical ears what they were not understanding and perceiving before. And all of this takes place over the course of chapter six, seven, eight, and nine.

And the middle of that is this two -stage miracle. Now, why the two stages? Because the point is that Jesus was trying to demonstrate to the disciples and to us a couple of things.

First, he was trying to demonstrate that I think he was comparing their incomplete sight with their completed sight.

The perfect sight or seeing vaguely what was true and then also seeing clearly what is true. And this is the man who was blind.

He is healed and he sees it. He kind of perceives it as blurry. It's not clear. Then Jesus gives him sight fully and he sees it clearly.

The disciples, over the course of all of these miracles and all of this discussion with Jesus about the leaven of the

Pharisees and of Herod and the unbelief and the hardness of their heart and physical eyes that cannot see and physical ears but cannot perceive.

And do you yet see and do you yet not understand? And why don't you understand? All of that conversation over those weeks that Jesus, that Mark condenses down into chapter six, seven, eight, and nine, all of that conversation all came to its zenith, its climax, right here in chapter eight with this healing of the man who was blind.

He heals him partially and then says, do you see? A little bit, but not fully. And then he heals him fully so he can see.

And that miracle is played out with the apostles, with the disciples. They saw the miracles.

They didn't really perceive it, but they kinda did. And then after that healing, then they got it. Then Jesus took them from hard -hearted unbelief and lacking no spiritual sight, gave them a little bit of spiritual sight, and then eventually they saw it clearly, demonstrated by Peter's confession, you are the

Christ. And then right after that, Jesus revealed himself on the Mount of Transfiguration so that they were able to clearly see with their physical eyes what they had just perceived with their spiritual eyes.

And all of that, all of that work with the disciples is played out in that miracle of the man with the two -stage healing.

So when you see that in the context, you have this discussion about sight and understanding and lack of sight and lack of real understanding and then clear sight and clear understanding.

Then, of course, the man who was blind that Jesus healed in two stages, it fits exactly what he's been doing with the disciples.

And I wouldn't make too much out of this observation, but it is interesting that you have this pattern, back to our overhead, that you have this pattern, right?

The same thing is laid out twice, the feeding of the multitude followed by the crossing of the land and the sea, and they land at the same place,

Bethsaida, the conflict with the Pharisees, discussions about bread, a healing miracle, and then a confession of faith.

And as if the first one, as if that first series of events was not enough to give the disciples clear understanding, and it clearly wasn't, he takes them through the exact same series of events again, this time to give them clear understanding.

What happened with the man who was blind? Jesus laid his hands on him, gave him healing, he partially saw, did it a second time.

The two stages of the miracle parallel the two stages of what Mark unfolded with that series of events.

The miracle of the man who was blind who was healed in two stages is intended to demonstrate this transition from lack of spiritual sight to fullness of spiritual sight.

Yeah, I think I covered everything that I wanted to in that lesson. I hope that sort of spells out a little bit about what's going on there.

I think that there's a number of lessons that we can learn, and one of the reasons that I chose this passage, first, because it's been 13 years since I taught it, and I think there's a few new people here that weren't here 13 years ago.

But also because I think that looking at the miracle this way and zooming out, looking at the whole context and the theme that Mark is developing helps us to understand the importance of context and understanding an author's theme or storyline.

Sometimes when we read scripture, we read it in chunks, like paragraphs. You read a miracle, and then you move on to the next miracle, and it's almost like you forget what you read before in the passage, and then we come across a difficult thing like this, and we're like, well, it's just gotta remain a mystery and really don't understand what's going on here.

Sometimes it helps if we can just zoom out and look at a theme that's developed over chapters. The disciples didn't, the authors of the

New Testament, and the Old Testament for that matter, didn't write their books in by verses. They didn't write verse by verse. They didn't write chapter by chapter.

They wrote entire passages, long passages, where they're developing these long arguments. And it's helpful sometimes if we can just be reminded that the explanation of some difficult passages lies in looking at the entire and expanded context.

It's much larger than we at first imagined. Sometimes we just read the miracle, and we isolate that miracle, and then we struggle to find out what's the purpose of that odd thing right there in that little text, and if you can zoom out and catch the whole context, you see there's something bigger going on here.

And second, I think this is the point of the passage itself, and I just wanna draw a couple of quick lessons from the passage.

I think Mark's intended meaning, Jesus's intended meaning, I think one thing we can glean or be reminded of is that signs do not create belief.

The disciples saw the signs, still did not believe. The multitude saw the signs and didn't believe. The Pharisees saw the signs and didn't believe.

Herod wanted, he heard of signs, he wanted to see signs, but even if Jesus had done a miracle in Herod's presence on trial before Herod, Herod would not have believed.

Signs do not create belief. They do not create faith. Because as with the problem with all unbelievers, the issue is never a lack of evidence, it is always a love for darkness.

Second, faith is taking God as his word and responding to the light that we already have.

The disciples had seen enough to believe. They had seen enough to leave them without excuse. And true biblical faith is looking at what is on display, what we can see and what we can hear, and understanding the light that we have been given and responding in biblical, trusting, obedient faith.

That was what the disciples were responsible to do. That's what we are responsible to do. And then the third lesson

I think that is here is that we must be reminded that Jesus is the only one who can give clear sight, both physically and spiritually.

Ultimately, the disciples needed to have their eyes open, they were spiritually darkened, and though they were responsible for their unbelief, and they really were without excuse for their unbelief, it took

Jesus to give them that clear sight and to open up their eyes so that eventually, Peter would confess, you are the Christ.

That understanding, that spiritual grasp of the true significance of who God is, is a divine work.

It's a supernatural work that must take place in the heart of anybody who will believe. And ultimately, it is only

Jesus who can do that. And that is what the miracle of the two -stage miracle, the man blind, demonstrates, that Jesus is the one who gives partial sight and he is the one eventually who gives fullness of sight.

And he did that for the man physically and he did it for the disciples spiritually. All right, so that's Mark chapter eight.

Now I will just open it up and say, is there any questions? I'm not even gonna go back through the chat here, but are there any questions about that miracle and the understanding of it in context?

I have not been watching the chat, so Peter will have to post that in the comments here and we'll see what comes up.

A question, why is it so hard for the disciples to believe? I thought they were chosen because of their belief in Jesus.

No, we're never chosen because of our belief in Jesus. Our belief in Jesus is the result of our being chosen. So that, we need to make sure that we get that right.

It was not, they were intrigued by Jesus, but some of those people like the disciple,

St. John chapter one, and you would think that I remember this, it was Andrew who went to Peter and said, we found the one of whom

Moses and the prophets wrote. There was a level of understanding and belief in the disciples, but not a full understanding and significance of who

Jesus was and what he came to do. That is something that took those three years. It's not that these men were

Bible scholars right out of the gate, where they understood fully exactly everything what Jesus was claiming and doing.

They were chastised on multiple occasions for their lack of understanding and their lack of true belief, even in spite of the evidence that they were given.

So no, we're not chosen, and neither were the disciples because they believed. Just like Judas was chosen, but he was not a believer.

It is our choosing or, and we're talking about election and not selection here, but our choosing, our election, is what results in our belief.

It's not what, it's not the, our belief does not result in our election or our choosing.

It is the other way around. The disciples would be the same thing. I'm sure that there are disciples there who knew of Jesus and heard of him and had some understanding and perception of this and some level of belief at some point, but Jesus' constant chiding of them and rebuking of them and reproving them for their hard -heartedness and their lack of insight and sight in that instance demonstrates that they, though they may have had a partial belief in him, a partial perception, like the man who was blind after the first stage of the miracle, their full understanding was something that came much later.

Why did Jesus tell the used -to -be -blind guy not to go back into the village? This is kind of an odd thing.

There are instances where in the Gospels, Jesus says to the people that he healed, go and tell everybody what the

Lord has done for you. There are other points where Jesus says, go and don't tell anybody what has happened, and I think that each individual instance of that has to be determined by the context.

There were, and we're not necessarily privy to all of the context of what was going on. There were times when

Jesus wanted other people to know, and I think his sovereign purposes of calling people and directing events and having the crowds come out, there are other times when the crowds were pressing in on him so heavily that Jesus wanted them to be silent about the miracle that had been done, and I think that in each case that it accomplished his sovereign purposes of what he wanted people to know and when and how, et cetera.

So I think that's the only answer I can give. And in this situation, it does seem as if he told them, oh, now

I have to scroll back here. It does seem that he told this man to go into the village and not tell anyone because at this point, for whatever reason,

Jesus wanted to keep perhaps his presence secret, and I don't think that that's something that we can know for certain exactly why

Jesus did that. We can just observe that there are times when he says, go tell everyone, and there are times when he says, go tell no one.

Why, I don't know. I think it has to do with the crowds and his people receiving him, and also the amount of light, right?

There were times when Jesus hid truth from people lest he increase their judgment. It was an act of mercy and an act of judgment to hide the truth from them, and there are other times when he gave full disclosures to people in order to increase their judgment.

So his sovereign purposes are accomplished in both of those actions at various times in the

Gospels. About timing, is not time yet.

Oh, yeah, as our live studio audience just pointed out, there were times when leading to the cross, he just simply said that the time is not yet for this.

So he knew exactly the timing of all of these events, and he knew what the timing of his eventual death was and his crucifixion and how everything needed to play out, and I think that a lot of times we see

Jesus making statements that, in the sovereign sense, are directing the affairs of exactly how all of it was going to play out, knowing what the end was gonna be.

I'm hoping that I didn't, let me see if I missed anybody here. All right.

Somebody wanted to see the overhead again. Oh, you wanna see the overhead again? Put that up there.

Take a screenshot. I could post that. I don't know if I can post a file in the chat, but I could post that if you want to, something.

Question, can I oversee the overhead again? Oh, there we go, we got to do that. Why did Jesus, we covered that one.

Why did Jesus tell the used to be blind guy to go back into the village? Is that you twice, Chamquito? All right, there's no more questions about John chapter eight.

I'll hang out here and watch the chat. And if anybody has anything else you want to throw out there, let me know.

No further questions. That was all that he had listed. From St.

Mary's, Georgia. I didn't know there was a St. Mary's, Georgia. There's a St. Mary's, Idaho too.

All right, well, I'll leave this streaming for a couple of seconds. Oh yeah, so I don't know if this is

Kim that pointed that out or Cornell, but sometimes people are a city earned no more truth.

Right, and remember, where was this miracle done? No, this is a good point. Thanks for bringing that up, Cornell or Kim, whichever one of you guys brought that up.

This miracle was done in Bethsaida, Peter's hometown. And so it is very possible that this condemnation of Bethsaida that Cornell just mentioned in the chat, that that condemnation of Bethsaida, woe to you,

Chorazin, woe to you, Bethsaida, for the miracles that occurred in the entire incitement. They would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes, et cetera.

They had received, because Bethsaida was basically Jesus's operational hometown for his ministry. The amount of miracles done in Bethsaida and Chorazin, and they're very close to each other, the north side of the

Sea of Galilee. I've been to Bethsaida. Chorazin is right around the corner. It's just a short walk away. These two little villages that were there, they're just like really close to one another.

The amount of miracles that Jesus did in those two villages was substantial. The bulk of his miracles was done in the northern regions of the land of Israel, and right around Chorazin and Bethsaida.

So they had received tremendous light. And so it's interesting that Jesus, before the miracle, if you notice this, he took the man out of the village of Bethsaida, outside of the village, and did the miracle outside instead of in the city.

So, and then he told him not to go back in and tell anybody about it. So it might be that Jesus in doing that was indeed not giving any more light to Bethsaida.

That's a good observation. Thanks for pointing that out. I had forgotten about the context of the miracle of the place, Bethsaida. That may be the very reason why he did not give them permission to go back in and tell anyone, so as to not give any more light to the city of Bethsaida, because they already had received more than enough to be judged.

All right, any other questions? All right, well, we'll be back here for church.

Well, not really church, because there's no music. Oh, next Sunday, we might do a little something different here for next

Sunday. We might have music, trying to work that out, and hoping that that happens.

So we'll see, but next Sunday will be a little bit different. I might even put on a tie and a different shirt. It won't be

Duluth Trading Company. With armpit gussets, it might be a different shirt, like a dress shirt, and we may do something out in the sanctuary for next

Sunday, since it's Easter Sunday. But we'll let you know what we got going on for that, and I'm not sure yet about Sunday school, if there'll be

Sunday school next week or not. That's still kind of up in the air. I haven't decided about that. I'm tempted to say no, so that I can enjoy some pancakes and scrambled eggs and ham for Easter breakfast.

So not that my wife is gonna make that for me for Easter Sunday, but it would be nice. Okay, so if you're chiming out, chiming in, we will start the next live stream here probably in about 15 minutes.

I'll start it early, and I'm gonna stick around a little later after the next live stream as well to hang out.

I miss you guys, and I sure hate that this is how church is for these few weeks.

This has been miserable as far as I'm concerned. All right, I'm gonna stop this, and I'll see you guys in about 15 minutes.