Mark Revisited: The Samantha Davidova Library Book 10

By Samantha Davidova

"Follow Me!"- A Brief Exposition of the Gospel of Mark Written by Samantha Davidova (September to November 2024) Mark Chapter 1 The first chapter of the Gospel of Mark consisting of forty five verses is like the other opening chapters of the four gospels slightly longer than the typical length of a chapter being concerned with setting the scene of the events that it will subsequently go on to narrate and so we have that it is "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God" Mark endeavouring to speak of a beginning to this story of salvation he thereafter goes on to tell as though picking up the more obviously creative language of the first chapter of John which boldly contrasts the new creation in Christ to the original creation of the world narrated by Moses which had begun with those famous words "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." The phrase "heavens and earth" had been used to portray the nation of Israel alluding to its rulers and ruled particularly in Deuteronomy 32:1-2, Isaiah 1:2, 10; 65:17-18, a situation which would again resume during the foretold Millennial rule of Christ and the Saints in Revelation 5:10; 20:4 where Revelation 5:10 declares that in the restoration of Israel''s kingdom under Jesus Christ as king that they as his government would rule over (Greek "epi π" also translatable as "upon") the earth either denoting the common people still subject to sin and death at that epoch over whom they would exercise their benevolent influence or else a direct reference back to the land of Israel promised to the Jewish patriarchs as bequeathed to them post-resurrectionally "forever." Certainly "the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ" recalls these things in so much as the "heavens and earth" idiom became figurative of the Jewish national politic in later Scriptures over whom Christ is to reign as the foretold Jewish Messiah or king of the line of David inheriting both the inheritance promises concerning the land made to the Patriarchs (Galatians 3:16) as well as those concerning David''s throne as his heir which although not plainly stated here may be implied with Mark''s use of "the beginning" motif pregnant with hidden meaning. For it is significantly added in verse 1 that it was because this Jesus Christ was "the Son of God" that he had such a role for we recall God''s promise to king David through Nathan the prophet when he had desired to build the deity a house (i.e. temple) in which he might dwell that when his days would be fulfilled and he would be laid to rest in the sepulchres of his fathers that God would raise up his offspring after him that would proceed from his bowels and establish the throne of his kingdom forever it being noted in verse 14 of 2nd Samuel chapter 7 that God would be his Father and he would be God''s son appearing to contradict the statement in the preceding verse 12 that this Messianic king would be a direct descendant of king David. But not precisely so for there was a sense in which he would be both a Son of David and a Son of God through the miracle of the virgin birth accomplished upon Mary David''s descendress (both the genealogies of Jesus in Matthew 1:6, 16 and Luke 3:23, 31 identify Joseph Jesus'' "presumed" father as a descendant of David but it may be implied that Mary was too not only from the prophetic statements of Psalms 132:11, Jeremiah 23:5; 33:15 etc that required her to be so but moreover from the requirement that Joseph was obliged according to the Mosaic Law to marry within his own tribe lest one''s family''s possession and inheritance in Israel be transferred from tribe to tribe, Numbers 36:8-9 warning against such inter-tribal marrying upon these grounds). David himself understood by inspiration that God intended to intervene in the physical laws of human procreation and rebirth so that one who would be his descendant would in fact be far superior to him...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0F5N7FVZD
• ISBN13: 9798280382138
• Release Date: April 2025
• Publisher: Independently published
• Length: 128 Pages
• Dimensions: 8.0" x 0.3" x 5.0"