The Therapeutic Bible – The Gospel of Mark: Acceptance • Grace • Truth

By Sociedade Bíblica do Brasil and Jairo Miranda

The Therapeutic Bible is an original edition, perhaps unique in the world today. A group of highly regarded Christian mental health professionals — supported by the Brazilian Body of Christian Psychologists and Psychiatrists and by the Bible Society of Brazil — have dedicated themselves to the task of commentating the therapeutic content of the biblical text, using their gifts and professional experience to explain how the Holy Scriptures foster our physical, mental, and spiritual health. This volume is the first fruit of this work in the English language, in the hope and prayer that the Wonderful Counselor will use it to help bring rest and relief to many souls who seek comfort from God's Word.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sociedade Bíblica do Brasil
• Release date: Mar 29, 2016
• ISBN: 9788531115639

Book preview

Good News Translation. The Therapeutic Bible. Acceptance, Grace, Truth

The Gospel according to

Mark

The United Bible Societies is a world fellowship of National Bible Societies, joined together for consultation, mutual support and action in their task of achieving the widest possible, effective and meaningful distribution of the Holy Scriptures and of helping people interact with the Word of God. Bible Societies seek to carry out their task in partnership and co-operation with all Christian churches and with church-related organisations. You are invited to share in this work by your prayers and gifts. The Bible Society, in your country will be very happy to provide details of its activities.

The Therapeutic Bible - Gospel of Mark

© Bible Society of Brazil, 2016

P.O. Box 330 06453-970 Barueri, São Paulo – Brazil

email: [e-mail]

All rights reserved

Bible text

The Good News Translation

© 1992 American Bible Society

All rights reserved

Presentation

We are pleased to present The Therapeutic Bible to you. It is the fruit of the loving reading of the Word of God in the midst of our families. We, the authors, are Christian mental health professionals committed to a personal testimony of the grace and truth manifested in Jesus Christ.

We believe in personal salvation in Jesus Christ, the incarnation of his life, the Son of God the Father, the first fruits of the biology of resurrection by the powerful action of the Holy Spirit who inspires us, draws us close, and enables all of our relationships: with God, with others, and with ourselves.

Our professional task, psychotherapy and counseling, puts us in daily contact with the faces of our patients. It is in them that we have witnessed the daily mystery that reveals itself in their gaze. In this mystery we testify that God is indeed present.

The comments accompanying the sacred text originate from these meetings. They are rooted in wonder: consultation with our patients is scheduled by grace. In this sense we are happy to meet in our offices with the envoys of the Lord, who were sent to experience kinship with the love of God revealed in Jesus Christ and become part of a new family that is the Church. They speak words in everyday language that testify to the decisive importance that faith has in our lives and professions.

These comments, thus, are written as prayers, designed to encourage listening of the text. The decisive turn is in the text that gives itself to us and that the Holy Spirit allows us to receive. The joy and satisfaction to awaken this wonderful experience is the goal of The Therapeutic Bible.

The authors

Preface

A group of eighteen Christian mental health professionals, members of the Brazilian Body of Christian Psychologists and Psychiatrists (CPPC) and supported by both the CPPC and the Brazilian Bible Society (SBB), have worked with great effort to identify and explain the various fostering elements of mental, physical, and spiritual health that exist in the Holy Scriptures. In 2011 the New Testament commentary was published in Brazil. What you have in your hands, though, is being published for the first time in any language: the New Testament commentary combined with commentary on the Book of Psalms.

We pray that God blesses all the readers of the biblical text, the commentaries, and the explicative boxes — and hope that this work helps each reader to grow in physical, emotional, and spiritual health. We would appreciate any comments or suggestions that readers have so that we can improve our work — after all, our objective is to cover the entire Bible, and there will certainly be much that needs improvement as we tackle this difficult yet enriching task which has blessed our lives so far. We solicit your prayers for our editorial team, that The Therapeutic Bible will be an instrument that brings acceptance, grace, and truth on the part of God to our people in need.

Jairo Miranda (team coordinator)

Karl Kepler (editor, The Therapeutic Bible)

About the CPPC

The Brazilian Body of Christian Psychologists and Psychiatrists (CPPC), an active organization since 1976, researches and promotes the dialogue of the science and practice of psychology and psychiatry with the Christian faith. Through the years we have noted that in spite of occasional tensions, it is not necessary to give up either scientific truth or the truth revealed in Scripture — we believe that both originate in God.

We promote conferences, meetings, fellowships, lectures, and agreements with educational as well as ecclesial institutions. We publish Psychotheology magazine and make ourselves available to our readers on our Internet site: www.cppc.org.br, where one can access diverse texts of our authorship, find professionals in every region of Brazil, and get to know us better.

The CPPC supports the initiative of The Therapeutic Bible, and hopes that its collaboration with this project will lead more people to encounter a path of wisdom and health in their lives, not only in the physical dimension, but also in the emotional and spiritual.

Index

Cover

Colofon

Presentation

Preface

Thematic Box Index

Mark

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Writing and Translation Teams

Thematic Box Index

Miracles of Jesus and False Miracle Workers

The Parable of the Sower and the Other Parables

Jesus Heals the Woman: From Girl to Adult

Illness or Demon Possession?

A Personal Experience with the Cross

The Passion of Christ and Our Response

Counseling at the Foot of the Cross

The Gospel according to

Mark

Go to chapter index

This is probably the earliest of the four gospels, written between AD 50 and 70; it is also the shortest, and served as a source for Matthew and Luke to write their accounts. The Gospel of Mark is a sequence of brief narratives of the life of Jesus and his activity. The author seeks to show the reader who Jesus is from the reports of people who lived with him. The text does not tell the name of its author, but leaders of the early church said it was John Mark, a cousin of Barnabas, who initially accompanied Paul in part of his first missionary journey, and later became Peter’s assistant. It is also said that Peter was the main source of information in this gospel — and indeed, the many details of the narratives suggest the presence of an eyewitness. Special attention is given to the actions of Jesus and also to his reactions and feelings.

Mark 1

The Preaching of John the Baptist

(Mt 3.1–12; Lk 3.1–18; Jn 1.19–28)

¹ This is the Good News about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

1.1 the Good News. Gospel is not an exact term used to name a book of the Bible, but refers to the good news about the salvation brought by Jesus Christ. Thus, the book announces the gospel of Jesus (Christ = Messiah), the Son of God, or simply, the good news of God. The saving action of God, expressed through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, happens continuously, because the gospel is divine action even today, for all of humanity.

² It began as the prophet Isaiah had written:

"God said, ‘I will send my messenger ahead of you

to clear the way for you.’

1.2-3 as the prophet … had written. This is a combined quote of Ml 3.1 and Is 40.3.

³ Someone is shouting in the desert,

‘Get the road ready for the Lord;

make a straight path for him to travel!’ "

⁴ So John appeared in the desert, baptizing and preaching. Turn away from your sins and be baptized, he told the people, and God will forgive your sins.

1.4-8 John the Baptist. John, the Baptizer, was certainly seen as a strange character: he dressed in clothes made from camel’s hair and ate locusts and wild honey. Today, he would be considered mentally unstable, or a mystical leader of a cult. He proclaims a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Ritual practices of washing or immersion were quite common in Judaism, especially among the Essenes, a group of Jewish purists who lived in isolated communities in the desert, such as Qumran. Baptism occurs only once for a person who adheres to Christianity; for the Jews, immersion is practiced whenever one needs purification in order to return to a state of purity. John points to the one who will come after him, the Christ. He emphasize further that this one will baptize in a new way, not with water but with immersion in the Holy Spirit. See the box John the Baptist, Prophetic Personality (Jn 1).

⁵ Many people from the province of Judea and the city of Jerusalem went out to hear John. They confessed their sins, and he baptized them in the River Jordan.

⁶ John wore clothes made of camel's hair, with a leather belt round his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. ⁷ He announced to the people, The man who will come after me is much greater than I am. I am not good enough even to bend down and untie his sandals. ⁸ I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.

The Baptism and Temptation of Jesus

(Mt 3.13—4.11; Lk 3.21–22; 4.1–13)

⁹ Not long afterwards Jesus came from Nazareth in the province of Galilee, and was baptized by John in the Jordan.

1.9-11 Jesus came from Nazareth. Jesus appears in the text already as an adult and being baptized by John. In baptism we have the representation of dying to our old nature and being reborn by the Spirit to new life. Jesus fully assumes the human condition in need of the new birth, demonstrating that he is representative of sinners. the Spirit. The Spirit of God comes upon those who open their hearts to the Father. In this scene we have a beautiful Trinitarian expression of God.

¹⁰ As soon as Jesus came up out of the water, he saw heaven opening and the Spirit coming down on him like a dove.

1.10-11 You are my own dear Son. God opens the heavens and makes his announcement: that one there is his son! The divine paternity of Jesus, announced in the first verse, is proclaimed by God himself. Thus, the messianic calling of Jesus is rooted in the certainty of divine affiliation. The interior force and the psychological and spiritual health of Jesus have to do with the love through which he was generated, nurtured, and reared. Joseph became his human father, loving and protective, with Mary. Now an adult, as he begins his public life, Jesus receives this declaration of love from the Father. These are words that every parent can and should pronounce for their children, from the day they are born and throughout their life. Love should not be only demonstrated through good care, but should also be made explicit with kind words.

¹¹ And a voice came from heaven, You are my own dear Son. I am pleased with you.

¹² At once the Spirit made him go into the desert,

1.12 into the desert. It is the Holy Spirit that drives Jesus into the wilderness, possibly next to the river Jordan. The desert is a geographic reality of many biblical events. It is the place chosen by God to reveal to man what is in his heart (Dt 8.2), that is, a face to face encounter with oneself and the Creator. In the desert, Jesus was confronted by the Devil (Greek diabolos: that which divides, promotes disunity). Here, only the wild beasts eased his loneliness and accompanied him for 40 days. The desert can also be understood as a metaphor of the hard times, of trials that God allows and thrusts upon us. The desert, in