The power of Christ the Servant
On the same day, when evening had come, He said to them, “Let us cross over to the other side.” Now when they had left the multitude, they took Him along in the boat as He was. (Mark 4:35-36)
When I first became a Christian, my father told the owner of the bakery where he worked about my new-found faith in the Lord Jesus. A little time later, the owner came to our house to give me an Emmaus Bible Study Course on the Gospel of Mark. It’s a great thing to show an interest and care for those young in the faith and I have never forgotten this kindness. The book stimulated me to study the Word of God as I learned about Jesus being the Servant of God in the Gospel of Mark.
Mark writes in chapters 4 and 5 of the power of Christ’s service in four distinct ways. Mark describes the Lord Jesus’ power over disaster, the devil, disease, and death.
What has always impressed me is the way Mark begins this narrative with the words “they took Jesus along in the boat as He was” (Mark 4:36). These few words are often overlooked but are so important. Mark describes the Lord Jesus, who had spent Himself in ministering to multitudes, being helped into a boat by His disciples and falling fast asleep. He paints a picture of an exhausted Servant. It was from this place of apparent weakness that the Lord awoke to demonstrate His astonishing power by stilling the storm, delivering Legion, healing the desperately ill lady and by raising Jairus’ daughter from the dead. Mark himself experienced a time in his own life when the service he undertook became too much for him, and he returned from the mission field. He must have felt a deep sense of failure. Paul was not willing to take him on another missionary journey. Instead, Barnabas took Mark to Cyprus, probably to his own home. Nearing the end of his life, Paul writes to Timothy, “Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is very useful to me for ministry” (2 Timothy 4:11, ESV).
Jesus, though all-powerful, knew the pressure and demands of service. He knew, as the Servant of God, weariness, sorrow, tears, distress, suffering and death. These were means through which He demonstrated the power and majesty of His love and grace. He understands the times when we are overwhelmed and at the end of our strength. And He moves the hearts of those who can best help us. There are times when we need a Barnabas, and there are times when we need to be a Barnabas.
May the Lord use the present crisis to make us more tenderhearted and responsive to those needs He wants us to address.
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