Daily Lesson for Tuesday 23rd of July 2024 Read Mark 4:10-12. Why did Jesus teach in parables? A surface reading of these verses gives the impression that Jesus taught in parables to keep outsiders in the dark. But such a perspective does not fit with Jesus’ actions elsewhere in Mark. In Mark 3:5-6, Jesus is … Continue reading –>
Daily Lesson for Monday 22nd of July 2024 Jesus was done with the parable and gave no immediate explanation. According to the text (Mark 4:1), Jesus spoke it before “a great multitude.” Only later, with a smaller group (Mark 4:10), did He explain what the parable meant. Read Mark 4:13-20. How did Jesus interpret the … Continue reading –>
Daily Lesson for Sunday 21st of July 2024 Read Mark 4:1-9. What are the different soils like, and what happens to the seed that falls on them? When reading the parables of Jesus in the Gospels, people often want to jump quickly to the interpretation. After all, is that not the point of these stories—to … Continue reading –>
Daily Lesson for Sabbath 20th of July 2024 Read for This Week’s Study Mark 4:1-34, James 1:21, Isaiah 6:1-13, Psalms 104:12, Daniel 4:10-12. Memory Text: “Then He said to them, ‘Take heed what you hear. With the same measure you use, it will be measured to you; and to you who hear, more will be … Continue reading –>
Inside Story for Friday 19th of July 2024 By Andrew McChesney Fourteen-year-old Payel changed after a 14-year-old friend committed suicide. Once outgoing, she sat quietly in the corner. Then she began to scream, shiver, and shake for no apparent reason. Terrified, she confided that she was being visited by someone who looked like her dead … Continue reading –>
Daily Lesson for Friday 19th of July 2024 Read Ellen G. White, “Levi-Matthew,” Pages 272–280; “The Sabbath,” Pages 281–289, in The Desire of Ages. “When questioned, ‘Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath days?’ Jesus answered, ‘What man shall there be among you, that shall have one sheep, and if it fall into … Continue reading –>
Daily Lesson for Thursday 18th of July 2024 Read Mark 3:20-21. What experience led Jesus’ family to consider Him out of His mind? A charge of mental instability is quite serious. Typically this arises from experiences where a person is a threat to his or her own safety. Jesus’ family felt this way about Him … Continue reading –>
Daily Lesson for Wednesday 17th of July 2024 Read Mark 3:20-35. What connection do you see between the two stories intertwined in this passage? This passage is the first “sandwich story” in Mark, where one story is begun and then is interrupted by another story, with the first story completed only afterward. The outer story … Continue reading –>
Daily Lesson for Tuesday 16th of July 2024 In Mark 2:23-24, the Pharisees accuse the disciples of breaking the Sabbath. According to Jewish tradition, 39 forms of labor were forbidden on the Sabbath, which, in the Pharisees’ minds, included what the disciples had done. Read Mark 2:23-28. How does Jesus counter the charge brought by … Continue reading –>
Daily Lesson for Monday 15th of July 2024 Read Mark 2:13-22. Who was Levi, the son of Alphaeus, and why would there be an objection to him becoming a disciple of Jesus? Tax collectors in Jesus’ day were civil servants under the local or Roman government. They were unpopular among the Jewish population in Judea … Continue reading –>
