A Do Nothing Day 📺 Because of Unbelief

Mark 6:1 - 6

He went away from there and came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him. ² And on the Sabbath, he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished, saying, “Where did this man get these things? What is the wisdom given to him? How are such mighty works done by his hands? ³ Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. ⁴ And Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his hometown and among his relatives and in his own household.” ⁵ And he could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them. ⁶ And he marveled because of their unbelief.

And he went about among the villages teaching.

As I was gathering information for today’s devotion Ray Steadman quoted the following about today’s scripture…

“We can gather up the meaning of this whole account in just a few words: Limited views mean limited lives. That is, if your view of life is so narrow… so withered and shrunken as to include nothing but what you can see and feel… taste and smell… or hear and reason, then your life is going to be horribly deprived and poverty stricken. And this is how it was in Nazareth.” … I thought that summarized it perfectly.

And today’s scripture begins with Jesus teaching on the Sabbath in the synagogue and His teachings amazed the people in Nazareth.

To help bring better understanding this is what the Amplified Bible says, in verse 2: and many who listened to Him were astonished, saying, “Where did this man get these things [this knowledge and spiritual insight]? What is this wisdom [this confident understanding of the Scripture] that has been given to Him, and such miracles as these performed by His hands?

It seems like they were taken by surprise by the power and the depth of Jesus’ thinking and the fact that He performed miracles.

Their reaction is found in verse 3:

"Isn’t this the carpenter? Isn’t this Mary’s son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon? Aren’t his sisters here with us?" And they took offense at him.”

Which is sad because these townspeople had known Jesus all His life… they watched Him grow up, and had seen Him daily yet Mark tells us-- And they took offense at him.

Again, in order to bring a little more clarity, I’ll refer to the AMP bible And it reads: “And they took offense at Him and were hurt [that is, they disapproved of Him and it hindered them from acknowledging His authority]; and they were caused to stumble and fall.”

You see their disapproval blinded them to the fact that He was anointed by God as the Messiah.

They had seen Him grow from a young boy and they were having great difficulty accepting that He was a prophet let alone the Jewish Messiah.

They thought they knew Him well enough to know that he just couldn’t be who He claimed to be.

They actually took offense and disapproved of Him… and that hindered them from acknowledging Jesus… They couldn’t honor Him or trust in Him.

Now verse 5 tells us that He could not do any miracles there, except lay His hands on a few sick people and heal them.

Now I want to emphasize that this is NOT saying that because of their lack of faith in Him, Jesus couldn’t do any miracles... That somehow because the people could not muster up enough faith in Him, He was powerless. … NO!

This is Jesus, the Christ, the Anointed One of God their lack of faith had no affect on His ability to produce miracles.

This is the One as were told in John 1:3 that: “Through Him all things were made; without Him nothing was made that has been made.”

Christ does not need the faith of the crowd in order to do miracles!

The reason He could not do miracles there was because of the attitude of the people!

Remember these people took offense at Him and disapproved of Him and did not believe that He had the authority to do miracles.

And since they didn’t believe Him – why would they bring anyone to Him for healing? 

They had taken offense at Him… they didn’t come to Him for healing.

And this point is so simple that it is often missed completely. Yet, it is backed up by this statement: “except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them.”

The people simply did not believe in and trust in Him… and the majority of them simply wouldn’t go to Him because of their lack of belief... their lack of faith.

You see, believing in Christ is a choice that all people must make. And in John 6:28 & 29, Jesus answers a question put to Him by a crowd that was following Him:

They asked him, "What must we do to do the works God requires?" Jesus answered, "The work of God is this: to believe in the one He has sent."

When we believe in Him, we will have no difficulty coming to Him for His healing and for restoration.