Verse by Verse Exploration of the Book of Mark

Chapter 8 Verses 27-33

Study Foundational Information:

The ²Torah is God’s teaching and instruction for our lives.  The disciples of Jesus followed his instructions.  Whatever the Rabbi did is what the disciples did also.  Jesus taught them from the foundation of the Torah or “Old Testament” while he was on this earth with them.  After he ascended and sat at the right hand of the Father, He sent the Holy Spirit to them and inspired them to put His words in writing for future generations.  In order for us to have the whole Gospel we must combine the Torah and the New Testament to rightly divide the Word of the living God.  Some say that the Old Testament is done away with.  Such a teaching limits and minimizes the impact of Gods’ Word and its application as related to the “New Testament”. 

Torah Foundational Scriptures:   Torah, translated: doctrine or teaching; consist of the first 5 books of the Bible written during the time of Moses.  These scriptures set the Old Testament foundation for our studies of Mark chapter

Genesis 2:15

 ¹⁵Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to tend and keep it. ¹⁶And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; ¹⁷but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

NOTE: God put Adam in the garden to work.  When God puts us somewhere, He wants us to work.  At this point, the curse had not fallen upon Adam yet.  The command that God gave Adam was to not eat of the fruit of the tree of life.  For Adam, this command was his Bible.  There was nothing else or any other commandment from God that he had to deal with. 

Genesis 2:18

¹⁸And the Lord God said, “It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him.” ¹⁹Out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them. And whatever Adam called each living creature, that was its name. ²⁰So Adam gave names to all cattle, to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper comparable to him.

²¹And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, and he slept; and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh in its place. ²²Then the rib which the Lord God had taken from man He made into a woman, and He brought her to the man.

²³And Adam said:

    “This is now bone of my bones

    And flesh of my flesh;

    She shall be called Woman,

    Because she was taken out of Man.”

 ²⁴Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

²⁵And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.

Genesis 3:1-7

¹Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden’?”

²And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; ³but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.’”

⁴Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. ⁵For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” ⁶So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. ⁷Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.

Introduction

In the Garden of Eden, Eve was tempted by Satan as we all know.  But in review of the scripture, Satan attempted to corrupt her mind by suggesting that the tree of knowledge would make her like God.  Adam and Eve only had one thing to refrain from and that was to not eat of the tree of knowledge.  We do the same thing today.  God tells us what we should and shouldn’t do and we do it anyway.  Adam and Eve only had one instruction and they couldn’t follow that.

Scripture:  Mark 8:27

²⁷Now Jesus and His disciples went out to the towns of Caesarea Philippi; and on the road He asked His disciples, saying to them, “Who do men say that I am?”

²⁸So they answered, “John the Baptist; but some say, Elijah; and others, one of the prophets.”

²⁹He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?”

Peter answered and said to Him, “You are the Christ.”

Who is God to you?  That is the question that we all need to ask ourselves.  To some, he is our ¹Sugar Daddy and come to the Father only when we need help or want him to do something that we desire.  If you lost everything that you had in life, would you still serve him?  Would you be able to go to the house of the Lord to worship Him if you had to catch the bus to service?  Who is Jesus to you?

Scripture:  Mark 8:30-32

³⁰Then He strictly warned them that they should tell no one about Him.

³¹And He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. ³²He spoke this word openly. Then Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him. 

NOTE:  Peter got the revelation of who Christ was.  Sometimes we as believers, think that a new understanding or have gained intellectual knowledge of the Lord will put us in a position to question God.  This train of thought is a mistake. 

If we are to strive to be like the Lord, we will be subjected to suffering at the hands of others, persecution by peers and rejected.  So this is a fact of our walk with the Lord. 

He spoke to all of the disciples but Peter was the one that got the ⁴revelation.  Peter took Jesus aside after He taught them to rebuke Him.  When we get a revelation from God, we must not let our head swell.

Scripture:  Mark 8:33

³³But when He had turned around and looked at His disciples, He rebuked Peter, saying, “Get behind Me, Satan! For you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.”

Was Jesus calling Peter Satan?  No. He was talking to the spirit attacking Peter’s mind, influencing him to try to rebuke the words of Jesus.  Peter just identified Jesus as the Christ, God in the flesh, and still tried to lord over Him.  Just that fast, Peter went from deep spiritual knowledge to thinking and speaking by his flesh.  The enemy will use thoughts to corrupt your mind.  Here are some examples of mind tricks of the enemy.

“You are losing your mind!” -  If you accept the thought, you will begin to walk in it.  Don’t take the thought.

“God doesn’t do that anymore.  That was in the Old Testament.” – By telling you that God does not work the miracles that he did in the Torah to discourage and confuse your faith in what God can do for you, which is anything.

“This is of the Devil” – We can’t allow the devil to confuse us by calling the things of God, of the devil.

“Who do you think you are that God would speak to you?” – God will speak to all of us who will listen and abide by His word.  The enemy comes to bring confusion.

The confusion of the mind causes us to believe that God isn’t God and to follow after the things that are desired by our fleshly man.  Satin speaks to our flesh to cause our mental confusion and reject the precepts and laws of God.  If we stand on the Word of God, confusion cannot be introduced into your environment.  Even in the household, the enemy brings confusion to cause a separation and conflict among the members of the home.

Eve accepted the lie of the enemy and then presented the same lie to Adam as a result of her acceptance.  If you allow the devil to confuse you with a lie and accept that lie, you will present that same lie to someone else causing confusion in their lives.  It is important to address this attack of the enemy by remembering what God Says…  What does God say about a matter?

I Corinthians 14:33

³³For God is not the author of confusion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints.

NOTE:  Authoring is to create or originate.  Therefore God is not the creator or originator of confusion.  God will not cause confusion in your life.  If there is confusion in your life, examine the situation because the source was satanic.  You can pin-point the source of confusion in your life and it’s definitely not of God.

How do you know when God is talking to you about a situation?  There will be peace in the situation.  Sometimes we experience peace in our decision but revert to fleshly thoughts during the process.

James 3:16

¹⁶For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there.

When it is all about you or you are focused on the belongings of others, confusion will accompany you.

NOTE:  Take a moment and read Deuteronomy 28

God’s law is not designed to feed your flesh but to enrich and grow your spirit/inner-man.  When you are walking in the flesh, you are not only warring against God but also everyone else. 

It was a man who initiated a war against God.  It was a man who listened to the voice of Satan and decided to believe the lie and disobeyed God.  If you find yourself in a state of confusion, understand that you are there because you have failed to follow the will and law of the Lord.  Yet, the blessings of the Lord exist in your life as the direct result of obedience and adherence to the word, law and instructions of the Lord Almighty.  By following the Word of the Lord, we can be a blessing to others.  Because our adherence to God’s will is not for us to individually be blessed, it is about touching others with the love of God.  Financial blessings aren’t given to those who believe so that they can be rich, but for the purpose of blessing others.

APPENDEX

1.    (Sugar Daddy is a term used to identify a person, usually male; who takes care of another person in hopes that that the relationship will get deeper.  The end result does not usually result in a deeper relationship but rather an ongoing usury by the recipient of the Sugar daddy’s care.).

2.    Torah – This is the first 5 books of the Bible written by Moses, under the inspiration of God as well as direct quotations from God received during his communion with the Lord on Mount Sinai.

3.    Confusion - to disturb in mind or purpose

4.    Revelation - something that is revealed by God to humans