Once, the temple in Jerusalem had been a place of prayer, singing, and sacrifice. But by the time of Jesus, it had degenerated into a raucous gathering, with all the commotion of a Middle Eastern bazaar. In Mark 11, Jesus finally “cleans house,” and we learn…

• How you are now God’s temple
• How Jesus’ behavior is a model for righteous anger
• What is the significance of Jesus cursing the fig tree?
• Does does faith enable you to “move mountains”?

Here’s the audio recording:

And here’s a copy of the lesson handout:

Thanks for listening! For a complete list of sermons and Bible studies, please visit my Teaching page.

Image credit: Special thanks to Gloris Young for sketching this week’s illustration

Faith is necessary to receive the free gift of salvation. But God also wants us to keep growing in faith, even after we are saved. How many problems in life are due to a lack of faith?

• We lack faith, so we forget to pray
• We lack faith, so we worry about the future
• We lack faith, so we try to fix problems on our own
• We lack faith, so we refuse to obey God’s word

Faith is not something we get in full at the moment of salvation. We’re expected to build it — like a muscle — making measurable progress. All of us should cry out to God like the apostles, “Increase our faith!” (Luke 17:5).

In yesterday’s study of Mark 9, we saw the faithlessness of the Jews, and a weak but growing faith in the heart of a man whose son was tormented by a demon. It’s a sad story, but one with a heartwarming ending. We learned together about…

• A great commotion as Jesus returns from the Transfiguration
• A young boy tormented by a demon
• The dangers of magic, witchcraft, ghosts, and demons in society today
• Jesus’ authority over Satan and demons
• God’s will to help your faith mature, like building a muscle
• The most important thing is not the size or quality of your faith, but placing that faith in Jesus alone

Here’s an audio recording of the lesson:

And here’s a copy of the handout.

Thanks for listening! For a list of other sermons and Bible studies organized by Bible passage and topic, please visit my Teaching page.

^{Image courtesy: special thanks to Gloris Young for sketching the picture in this week’s handout}

As Americans, we know a thing or two about taxation without representation, and how infuriating it can be to cater to the whims of a distant tyrant. Multiply that by 10, and you get a sense of how the Jews must have felt before Jesus arrived.

For centuries, Israel clung to the promise that a deliver would rescue them from foreign oppression. They probably expected another deliverer like Judas Maccabee. In 166 BC, Judas “the hammerer” had staged a revolt that took the occupying Syrians by surprise. The Jews recaptured Jerusalem, cleansed the temple from pagan worship, and reinforced the walls around the city. To this day, Hanukkah (the Feast of Dedication) commemorates this event.

But while Judas’ courage and cunning did buy Israel some religious freedom, the people failed to regain political independence. When Jesus arrived, Jewish nationalism was running at an all time high, and the people were desperate for relief.

What the people didn’t expect was a Messiah who would suffer and die. Yet that is precisely what Jesus said his rescue plan would involve in Mark 8:31-9:1. In this lesson, we discuss…

• What kind of Messiah did the Jews expect?
• A watershed moment in the Gospel of Mark
• What Jesus meant by handing Peter the “keys to the kingdom”
• Jesus’ surprising announcement of how the Son of Man would suffer
• The moment Peter acted on Satan’s behalf and earned a sharp rebuke

Here’s the audio recording:

And here’s a copy of the lesson handout.

Thanks for listening. This lesson is part of a three-month Series on Mark in our Sunday Morning Bible Study Community.

Back in second grade, we did a class activity that’s stuck with me to this day. Our teacher invited all the children to collect bottle caps and bring them to school to see if we could collect 5,000. Week after week, we brought our bottle caps in all our ziploc bags, carried them up to the front of the classroom, and poured them into one of the desks until it was completely filled up and spilling over. 5,000 bottle caps was a lot! And to think Jesus fed more than that with just five barley loaves and two fish, until they were completely satisfied.

The story of Jesus feeding the 5,000 is well-known, but no less amazing. If he can provide for such a large crowd, he can take care of your needs too. In this lesson, we discuss…

• What makes this story unique in the gospels
• God’s promise to supply all your needs
• Some encouraging testimonies of how God provided in hard times
• Why do the wicked seem to prosper, while many believers barely scrape by?
• How Jesus responds when the crowds press in
• A call to trust in the Lord, wait, and watch how he works

“The LORD God is a sun and shield; the LORD bestows favor and honor. No good things does he withhold from those who walk uprightly!” (Ps. 84:11).

Here’s the lesson audio:

And here’s a copy of the handout:

Every relationship has some kind of introduction. Mark is a great place to start if you want to know more about Jesus. In this lesson, we learn…

• Why we all should study Mark’s Gospel
• What makes Mark different from the other gospels
• What does it mean that Jesus is the “Christ”?
• How baptism of the Holy Spirit takes place in the life of a believer

Here’s a link to the audio:

And here’s a copy of the handout:

Thanks for listening. This is our opening study from our Sunday morning Bible Study Community on The Gospel of Mark. If you live in the Highland area, we invite you to join us Sundays at 9am in the IBC Fellowship Hall.