Mark 12 • The God You Can Know and Love

ByMelanie Newton Mark
Mark 12: The God You Can Know and Love
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God worked in the background to ready the world for His Son to make His appearance. Through angels, God announced the coming of His kingdom with Jesus as the king. Jesus confirmed that announcement in Mark chapter 1 and demonstrated it in His life that He is the king. Our king is caring and personal. The blog “Mark 2: Walking Home with Jesus” showed His personal attention to people in their homes. In Mark 5 and in Mark 7, He showed compassion for hurting women. Jesus challenged His followers in Mark 8 to be different from their world. In this post, we will learn from Mark 12 why our God is a God we can know and love.

Listen to this blog as a similar podcast from our Heartbreak to Hope Bible Study of Mark.

The Importance of Knowing God

 A scathing parable

At the beginning of Mark chapter 12, Jesus told a story called “The Parable of the Tenants.” The owner of a vineyard leased his land to tenant farmers then left. When the owner sent servants to collect some of the bounty from the vineyard, the farmers not only refused to give any fruit to the servants but also beat and killed some of them, including the owners’ son. Jesus concluded His story with this,

Haven’t you read this passage of Scripture: “‘The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone;the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?” (Mark 12:10-11)

The vineyard represented Israel. The owner was God. It was His land. The farmers represented the Jewish religious leaders. They neither knew God nor appreciated His goodness toward them. Instead, they did like the farmers and decided to kill the owner’s son Jesus and claim Israel for themselves. First, they tried to embarrass Jesus publicly with test questions. Each time, Jesus pointed out their deficiency in knowing God.

Test questions

1. The first question was about taxes.

They brought the coin, and he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?” “Caesar’s,” they replied. Then Jesus said to them, “Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.” And they were amazed at him. (Mark 12:16-17)

2. Another question was about marriage in the resurrection.

Jesus replied, “Are you not in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God? … Now about the dead rising—have you not read in the Book of Moses, in the account of the burning bush, how God said to him, ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. You are badly mistaken!” (Mark 12:24, 26-27)

3. Then, one of the teachers of the law came to Jesus. Remember they were like today’s lawyers or seminary professors. They were experts in the Jewish Law and taught it to others.

This man listened to Jesus and decided to ask Him this question,

“Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” (Mark 12:28)

The right answer

Jesus’ answer was simply this:

“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31)

Know God. Love God. Loving your neighbor as yourself is a natural outgrowth of loving God.

The lawyer agreed with Jesus.

“Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.” (Mark 12:32-33)

Loving God with all your heart, all your understanding, and all your strength is priority in your life, more pleasing to God than any good works you do. Jesus told him that he was not far from the Kingdom of God. Why is that?

The lawyer showed he had faith. Most of the religious leaders had degenerated from a personal relationship with God to outward practice of religion without heart. God wants your heart—the seat of your affections. This man had a heart that wanted to know God and believe truth about the God that he could know. We call that theology.

What Is Theology?

Everyone has theology

Theology is simply what you believe about God. Ready for this? All women are theologians. If you are a woman, you are a theologian. Whether we want to call ourselves that or not, we are the theologians in our spheres of influence. And it matters if we are good ones or not. It matters what we know about God. It matters what we think about God. It matters what we relate about God by words or actions to those around us.

I read this recently.

Your life is your billboard. And every day, you can choose the message to display. (Jayme Durant, Acts & Facts, 48 (11), p. 4)

You have influence. So, understanding the truth about God and being able to communicate that truth in casual conversation and serious discussion is one of your greatest assets for any relationship. You can use it for the good of your friends, spouse, children, workmates, and church groups. You use your theology to give them strength or drag them down. It is sobering to realize that someone else is helped or hurt depending on the state of my theology!

Where do we learn our theology?

We learn theology like we learn most anything else in life: Prepare by instruction, learn by experience. Prepare by instruction means studying the truths about God in the Bible. Learn by experience means to trust in what you have learned about God as you live out your life. In fact, apart from experience, theology is dull and detached.

It is as we study the truth about God in the Bible then trust Him as we live our lives that we learn true theology. You and I can face any impossible situation if we are prepared by instruction about God and teachable to learn through experience with God. But the first step is knowing the truth about God. He is the God you can know.

The God You Can Know

We can know the truth about God by what are called His attributes. We do not use that word very often, but we should know what it means.

An “attribute” is a quality or characteristic of someone or something.

For a person, an attribute is something generally true about that person. If someone says that you are always kind, that is an attribute of you. If someone says that you are always patient, that is an attribute of you. Attributes describe someone so that we can know more about him or her. Our study “The God You Can Know” teaches several attributes of God.

The attributes of God are things we can know about God. They describe His character and are true about Him all the time. God’s greatness is far beyond human understanding. But God has revealed enough about Himself in His Word so we can know who He is. The picture we get from the Scriptures reveals an awesome God! By knowing who He is, we can know Him better. By knowing Him better, we can learn to trust Him with our lives. He is truly the God you can know.

God’s Attributes Reveal His Character

So, let us consider a few of the attributes of God and how each one affects your view of God and your relationship with Him.

God’s SOVEREIGNTY

God is the sovereign ruler over His creation. He rules it with supreme authority and power.

King David declared this,

“How great you are, O Sovereign LORD! There is no one like you, and there is no God but you, as we have heard with our own ears.” (2 Samuel 7:22)

God says this about Himself.

I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come I say, ‘My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.’ (Isaiah 46:10)

Are you willing to recognize God’s authority over you—to trust that He knows what is best for you?

God’s HOLINESS

God’s holiness is a topic that is stressed often in the Bible. When we say that God is holy, that means God is set apart from anything that is sinful or evil.

God says this about Himself:

I am the Lord your God; consecrate yourselves and be holy, because I am holy. Do not make yourselves unclean by any creature that moves along the ground. I am the Lord, who brought you up out of Egypt to be your God; therefore be holy, because I am holy. (Leviticus 11:44-45)

The Bible teaches that our God is set apart from these:

  • Set apart from any other name.God’s name is holy. His name is set apart from any other name in the entire universe. That includes the names of other gods that people want to worship instead of the one true God.
  • Set apart from His creation. God is not like anything or anyone He has created. That includes angels and people. God is set apart from His creation.
  • Set apart from anything that is sinful or evil. In fact, this is what is stressed the most about God in the Bible. He is the most “holy,” and no one is as “holy” as He is. He is perfect.

Those who knew God recognized that about Him. The prophet Habakkuk declared this,  

“Your eyes [God] are too pure to look on evil. You cannot tolerate wrongdoing.” (Habakkuk 1:13a)

How does that make you feel that God can be trusted to always do what is good and right?

God’s OMNIPRESENCE, OMNIPOTENCE, and OMNISCIENCE

I call these the three omnis. David puts them together in Psalm 139 in such a way that we can understand them.

“You [God] are all around me, behind me and in front of me. You hold me in your power. I’m amazed at how well you know me. It’s more than I can understand.” (Psalm 139:5-6 NIRV)

  • “You are all around me, behind me and in front of me.” That isGod’s omnipresence. That means God is present everywhere at the same time. How does that make you feel that you cannot go to any place where God is not with you or cannot hear your prayer to Him?
  • “You hold me in your power.” That is God’s omnipotence. That means He is all powerful. God is more powerful than anything or anyone else in the entire universe. Yet, He directs it toward our good and is gentle enough to hold us in His hands. Do you feel confident that you can ask Him to work in your life, and He will do it?
  • “I’m amazed at how well you know me. It’s more than I can understand.” That is God’s omniscience. God is all knowing. If God knows everything there is to know, does anything good or bad in your life escape God’s notice or surprise Him?

God’s LOVE

We hear about this attribute all the time. God’s love is patient, kind, forgiving and considers what is best for the one being loved.

God said this about Himself,

Then the Lord came down in the cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name, the Lord. And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. (Exodus 34:5-7)

Those who knew God confirmed that truth,

“The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love.” (Psalm 103:8)

How does knowing this make you feel as you share your heart with Him?

God’s GOODNESS

God is good all the time. He is good in the tough times, in different ways for each person, and in what He allows or does not allow into our lives.

God said this about Himself:

And the Lord said, “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. (Exodus 33:19)

Those who knew God confirmed that truth.

“You [God] are good, and what you do is good.” (Psalm 119:68)

As you talk to your Heavenly Father, are you willing to trust His goodness in the way He chooses to answer your prayer?

Those are just a few of His many attributes. You can learn about these and more from The God You Can Know Bible Study. Our Father God is truly a God you can know. And He is a God you can love because He is trustworthy of your love.

God Is Trustworthy of Your Love.

Trustworthy God

Trust (faith) is always an issue of credibility. It is hard to trust God if you do not know Him. The more you know Him, the easier it is to trust Him. You do not have more faith by talking about faith. Getting to know the object of your faith who is your God, increases your confidence in Him. Knowing God’s character plus knowing His promises give you plenty of reasons to consider Him trustworthy. The Bible describes that confidence as having your feet firmly planted on solid rock with God as your Rock. He is a trustworthy God.

Trustworthy Father

Your God is also a trustworthy Father. Jesus continually taught His disciples to consider God as their Father. He taught them to pray to their Father God whom they could trust.

This God is your Father God, too. The moment you placed your trust in Jesus Christ for your salvation, you were adopted into God’s family as His child. He is the perfect Father, the most loving Father, the most dependable Father, and the Father who cares about your every need.

Dear reader, I know that some of you did not have a good earthly father. So, your concept of a father might be pretty scary. God knows that. But He wants you to know that you are dearly loved by your Father God. Dearly loved.

Think of the best father in any movie or TV show. Who comes to mind? God is even better than that father. And He wants you to know His character—those attributes that help you to know Him well, love Him wholeheartedly, and gain the confidence to trust Him as your Father God.

With that theology, what you can learn from the gospel of Mark is that knowing the truth about God leads to following His Son Jesus.

Knowing the Truth About God Leads to Following Jesus.

God’s Z’s

As a child, I always liked the television show called “Zorro.” Zorro was a masked warrior who fought evil and defended good. He would use his sword to leave engraved Z’s on walls and objects to declare his presence and strength. Well, God places Z’s in our paths that say, “Here I am. Look at me. Come to me.”

Like that, what Jesus did and said in His earthly life was an unmistakable Z to the people of Jesus’ day. How could you ever ignore such a demonstration of God through all those miracles? But the people did. And people still do today.

What was the single most important event in human history? The answer has to be the cross followed by the resurrection. That was a gigantic Z! God demonstrated His power over our greatest enemy—sin and its consequence death. God demonstrated His love in that He did this while we were still His enemies. God demonstrated His justice in a sinless Jesus who became sin for us and took that penalty for sin that we deserved—death. God demonstrated His grace in that He offered this payment for our sin so that we might be declared righteous, and perfectly acceptable to Him by faith. Our responsibility is to accept His plan. There is only one way to the true God—by faith in His Son Jesus Christ. That is His plan.

God’s plan—Jesus

Christianity is Christ! It is not a lifestyle or rules of conduct. It is not a society whose members were initiated by the sprinkling or covering of water. We are called first and foremost to a relationship with a Person—Jesus Christ.

I heard Bible teacher Rebecca Carrell say this:

God’s plan for your life is simple: Follow His Son. But you won’t follow someone you don’t trust. You can’t trust someone you don’t know, and you cannot know Christ apart from His Word. (Rebecca Carrell, heartstrongfaith.com)

That is why we study the Bible. We have not physically beheld the risen Christ as the apostles did. We must see Him through eyes of faith and allow the gospels to leap off the pages revealing our Lord. And Jesus is not just in the gospels. When you read the book of Acts, you can see repeatedly how intricately Jesus was involved in everyone’s lives even after He ascended to heaven.

God’s Invitation

Jesus invites every man, woman, and child into a close relationship with Himself as brothers, sisters, and friends just like He invited those who knew Him 2000 years ago. As you respond to His invitation to know Him and believe in Him, you discover that Jesus Christ is the ultimate grace-gift to you and to me.

Through seeing Jesus in the pages of the gospels, we get to see who God is because Jesus has the attributes of God—the very same ones. Our theology about God is sharpened as we know more about Jesus.

Women need good theology so we don’t get caught sitting on the fence like some of the people of Jesus’ day did. If we have good theology about our God, then we will not do harm when family and friends depend on us for counsel. We need good theology to train our children rightly about God, giving them the best information to make their own decision about the God we know and serve. The God who sacrificed His own Son so that we might be saved is a God we can truly know through our faith in His Son. And knowing Him should lead to loving Him wholeheartedly.

Let Jesus satisfy your heart with hope, healing, and love as you get to know Him and trust Him more each day.

The above information is covered in our Heartbreak to Hope Bible Study of Mark.

AI was not used to generate this post.

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