Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - The True Cost of Following Jesus | The Gospels | Mark 6:13–29

Episode Date: January 23, 2026

What does it really cost to follow Jesus? Does anything feel too "expensive" to surrender? What are you holding onto instead of following Jesus fully? In today’s episode, Jeff shares how Mark 6:13–29 challenges us to count the cost of discipleship and trust that surrender is possible because we are already loved by Jesus. Read the Bible with us in 2026! This year, we’re exploring the Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Download your reading plan now. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it so that others can find it, too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Mark 6:13-29 

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Jeff Parrott. Everything comes with a price, but sometimes the price of a thing causes you to turn away from it. Just the other day, I was perusing a rack of winter coats and came across one that I really wanted to take on future adventures. Everything looked and felt perfect. And then I saw the price tag. Once I did some mental math and figured out that I need a small business loan to legally take that coat home with me, I knew that we did not have a future together. The price tag ended the journey for me. Maybe for you with Jesus, everything looks and feels perfect until you see the price tag, the price tag of having to surrender that preference, the cost of having to fight that sin, the price tag of sacrificing for that difficult person or the cost of,

praying for that particular enemy. Maybe when you're facing the cost of following Jesus, you're like me with that pricey coat. Once you see that price tag for Christianity, you feel like the journey might be ending for you. You need to just turn away from it. Or maybe you feel like you could never start that journey to begin with. Our passage today presents us with a clearer view

of the price tag of a life following Jesus. It helps us consider the true cost associated with following him and what it might mean for our journey with him today. Now, as we get ready to approach God's word, let's pause and ask for His grace to move through this special time we have together. Heavenly Father, we do thank you for the gift of life and breath. We thank you for your word.

We bring before you our joys and our sorrows, our anxiety and our excitement, our calendars, and our contingencies, all of who we are. We bring it before you, and we ask that you would meet us in this space. Jesus help us abide in you as we engage with your truth. And Holy Spirit, we ask you to move in and through this time in Mark's gospel account. As we read your living word, may it read us

and restore us to new life with you. In Jesus' name, amen. Okay, we're going to take an extra moment to set up the context for our passage today in Mark 6 verses 14 through 29 because our text for today, like really the rest of Mark's gospel account, it fits into a bigger flow of thought. And once we appreciate that bigger flow of thought, we'll better understand why this narrative is here and what it's trying to tell us. So our passage today is all about the death of John the Baptist at the hand of Herod Antipus. Now, if we just zoom in on this passage and read it in isolation, it might seem like a randomly inserted historical account just to inform us about the outcome of the Baptist's life. But if we zoom out, we notice that this narrative about John the Baptist

is surrounded by activity between Jesus and the 12 disciples. Jesus sends out the 12 near the beginning of Mark chapter 6, and then the 12 return in verse 30 right after our passage here. Some scholars call this tactic a Markin sandwich. It's kind of a fun phrase, a Markin sandwich. where Mark surrounds a passage with a particular theme that emphasizes the point of the passage itself. So we notice that the bookends, the outside portions of this sandwich, they focus on the mission of the disciples as they are sent by Jesus and then return to Jesus. And that mission of Jesus through his disciples gives us a huge clue on what we should pay attention to in this passage in the middle of the sandwich.

because whatever happens here in our text today, it will tell us something about the nature of following Jesus. Specifically, it will tell us about the price that is paid when people decide to surrender to him. Okay, so our passage begins in verse 14 as Herod hears the news about the ministry of Jesus. He's trafficking in rumors that Jesus could be John the Baptist raised from the dead, or maybe the Old Testament prophet Elijah, or maybe Jesus is another prophet from long ago. In verse 16, Herod himself has taken in with the misinformed notion that Jesus was somehow a resurrected version of John the Baptist.

He exclaims, John, whom I beheaded, has been raised from the dead. Now, that statement from Herod, it tees us up for a recap of John the Baptist's death in verses 17 through 29. Now, I encourage you to read that entire narrative on your own with other people, but for our time together now, we're just going to focus on some themes related to that overarching question related to the context of our passage, that Markan sandwich. The question is this, what does John the Baptist's death tell us about the nature of following Jesus? What does it say about the cost

of discipleship. Now, when you read this account of John the Baptist's death, you can't help but notice how his commitment to the truth of God's kingdom is at the heart of his demise. We learn from verse 18, how John called out Herod for breaking the law of God in Leviticus 18 and Leviticus chapter 20 by marrying Herodius, the ex-wife of his half-brother Philip. This commitment to truth on John's part turns out to be a sacrificial commitment. Verse 19 describes how Herodius nursed a grudge against John and wanted to kill him, ultimately, accomplishing her goal by using her own daughter to play on the vanity of Herod during a special dinner party. Now, the thing to notice here is that John does not waver in his commitment to the truth of God's word and the

priorities of God's kingdom. He sees that price tag of living with the current of God's kingdom. and he willingly pays it. Now, take that with John and then contrast it with Herod, the man who is unwilling to pay the price of faith. We know from verse 20 that Herod is intrigued by John and by his message. In some ways, he was drawn to the truth of God's kingdom. But here's the thing. Fascination is not the same thing as faith.

Versus 26 through 27 described the agony of Herod confronting the price tag of faith. We read this. The king was greatly distressed, but because of his oaths and his dinner guests, he did not want to refuse her, so he immediately sent an executioner with orders to bring John's head. So it seems like from this passage, in some ways this was a difficult decision for Herod to give into the people-pleasing tendencies that he had and have John killed. In some ways, this was difficult. But in other ways, this was easy because to lose the approval of other people was too high of a price tag for him to pay in the journey of faith. So he turned away from it. Now that stirs up this observation. John was willing to pay

the price for living in God's kingdom. Herod chose not to pay it and he received the temporary payday of approval from other people. Now imagine the impact of that observation on the disciples of Jesus as they heard about John's commitment to the kingdom of God. Imagine the impact that this would have had on the first audience of Mark's gospel account facing persecution in the first century Roman empire. Imagine the impact that John's example can and should have on your life and my life today. When we consider the cost of following Jesus, are we willing to give up things to follow him, willing to give up a reputation, influence, freedom, willing to give up our very, lives? What's the thing for you that would make the price tag of following Jesus seem too high?

That would make you want to turn away. These are the kinds of questions that this passage confronts us with. Here's how the New Testament scholar James Edwards describes it. The sandwich structure, remember with Mark and Sandwich, the sandwich structure draws mission and martyrdom, discipleship and death, into an inseparable relationship. Whoever would follow Jesus must first reckon with the fate of John. John's martyrdom not only prefigures Jesus' death, but it also prefigures the death of anyone who would follow him. That's some good stuff right there. When we pause to reflect on this passage in its place in Mark, we're left with something to challenge us and something to comfort us. And the challenge and the comfort actually go together.

Here's the challenge. John's death and Herod's complicit role in it reminds us that the price tag of following Jesus is higher than we usually see. Now, we know that we're starting to feel the sticker shock of that price when the sincerity of our surrender makes us feel uncomfortable, when it makes us look weird to the watching world. It's a massive, massive price tag. That's the challenge. But here's the comfort. As big as the price tag of following Jesus is, there is a far bigger price that serves as the foundation for the Christian faith to begin with. That bigger ultimate price was the cost of Jesus' life on a Roman cross. I love how Dietrich Bonhofer describes this

comfort and challenge in his classic work, the cost of discipleship. He describes the grace of God as costly grace. read a short excerpt from the cost of discipleship and we'll just see how this costly grace coheres so well with the themes that we're reading about in our passage in mark six. Here's Bonhofer on costly grace. Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow. And it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life. And it is grace because it gives a man the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his son.

Ye were bought at a price. And what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon his son too dear price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us. man such good stuff there thank you bonhoffer if you feel like the cost of following jesus is too high that you just need to turn away that the journey might be ending for you or maybe you feel like you can never start that journey of following jesus to begin with i hope and i pray that bonhofer's words that the truth of mark six the truth of the gospel encourages you to keep going we don't pay the cost

to following Jesus in order to be loved by Him. We surrender that price tag because we are already loved by Him. If this is the cost of discipleship, it does not cut us off from the journey of faith. It casts us into the journey of faith, cultivating and catalyzing new life as we surrender our whole lives to the one who surrendered his life for us. Father, help us honestly face the price of following you. Help us to not water down the cost of discipleship, but wade into it with our whole selves. Jesus, we praise you for paying that ultimate price that ransomed us back to God on the cross.

This is a journey that starts and finishes because of your love. Spirit, would you surround us with a sense of your presence and the presence of others who will encourage us to live? with a costly faithfulness in response to your perfect faithfulness. We pray all of this because of your grace, for your glory, and in your story. In Jesus' name, amen.