Tag Archives: the Sea of Galilee

Stay or Walk Away

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“Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear? And do you not remember?” Mark 8:17b-18 ESV1

Read Matthew 16:1-12 & Mark 8:11-26

Jesus spent most of His time during His earthly ministry near the Sea of Galilee. “The sea’s location makes it subject to sudden and violent storms as the wind comes over the eastern mountains and drops suddenly onto the sea. Storms are especially likely when an east wind blows cool air over the warm air that covers the sea. The cold air (being heavier) drops as the warm air rises. This sudden change can produce surprisingly furious storms in a short time.”2  In this next account, an “east wind” was blowing, and a storm was brewing, but not in the physical sense.

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Weathering the Storms

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“Teacher, I will follow You wherever You go.” Matthew 8:19 ESV1

Read Matthew 8:18-27, Mark 4:35-40, & Luke 8:22-39

“When Jesus saw a crowd around Him” (Matthew 8:18), He said to [His disciples], ‘Let us go across to the other side of the lake’” (Luke 8:22b). “And leaving the crowd, they took Him with them in the boat, just as He was. And other boats were with Him” (Mark 4:35-36). On their way to the boats, “a scribe came up and said to Him, ‘Teacher, I will follow You wherever You go’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head’ (Matthew 8:19-20).

When this sincere scribe made his declaration, he was serious. He probably expected Jesus to be pleased. So, he was no doubt disheartened by Jesus’ reply. But I don’t think Jesus wasn’t discouraging him from making such a commitment, He was just warning this scribe that things are often not as simple as they may at first appear. This scribe, and the others who followed Jesus wherever He went, could not have conceived of the difficult situation they were about to encounter.

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