The Bible in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - Day 157: Following Jesus (2023)

Episode Date: June 6, 2023

Fr. Mike emphasizes that following Jesus as his disciples requires remarkable humility, faith, purity of heart, and courage. Today's readings are Mark 7-8 and Psalm 23. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/bibleinayear. Please note: The Bible contains adult themes that may not be suitable for children - parental discretion is advised.

Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz, and you're listening to the Bible in a Year podcast, where we encounter God's voice and live life through the lens of Scripture. The Bible in a Year podcast is brought to you by Ascension using the Great Adventure Bible Timeline. We'll read all the way from Genesis to Revelation, discovering how the story of salvation unfolds and how we fit into that story today. This day, 157, we are on day four of our second messianic checkpoint through the gospel of St. Mark. We're reading the gospel of Mark chapters seven and eight. We're also praying Psalm 23, which is going to sound familiar to many of you. Psalm 23 today, as always,

the Bible translation that I'm reading from is the revised standard version, second Catholic edition. I'm using the Great Adventure Bible from Ascension to read the scriptures. To download your own Bible in a Year reading plan, you can visit ascensionpress.com slash Bible in a Year. And if you want to, and you're able to, you can subscribe to this podcast in order to receive daily episodes. You also can rate this podcast. I don't know if anyone knows about that, but you can. You can give it zero stars, you can give it one star, you can give it five stars, you can write a review, whatever you like to do. But we are on day 157, which is remarkable. And just, I know I say this too often, but gosh, what a gift for 157 days, you have opened your heart and opened your mind to God's word. And

that is, that is, it's, it's not small. It is not a small thing. And so here we are reading from the gospel of Mark chapter seven and eight and praying Psalm 23, the gospel of St. Mark chapter seven, the tradition of the eldersers. Now when the Pharisees gathered together to him with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem, they saw that some of his disciples ate with hands defiled, that is, unwashed. For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands, observing the tradition of the elders. And when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they purify themselves. And there are many other traditions which they observe, the washing of cups and pots and vessels of bronze. And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, why do your

disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with hands defiled? And he said to them, well, did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men. You leave the commandment of God and hold fast the tradition of men. And he said to them, You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition. For Moses said, Honor your father and your mother, and he who speaks evil of father or mother,

let him surely die. But you say, If a man tells his father or his mother, what you would have gained from me is korban, that is, given to God, then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, thus making void the word of God through your tradition which you hand on, and many such things you do.

And he called the people to him again and said to them, Hear me, all of you, and understand. There is nothing outside a man which by going into him can defile him, but the things which come out of a man are what defile him. And when he had entered the house and left the people, his disciples asked him about the parable, and he said to them, Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a man from outside cannot defile him, since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and so passes on? Thus he declared all foods clean. And he said, What comes out of a man is what defiles a man. For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, fornication, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride,

foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a man. The Syrophoenician Woman's Faith And from there he arose and went away to the region of Tyre in Sidon. And he entered a house and would not have anyone know it, yet he could not be hidden. But immediately a woman whose little daughter was possessed by an unclean spirit heard of him and came and fell down at his feet. Now the woman was a Greek, a Syrophoenician by birth, and she begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. And he said to her, let the children first be fed, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs. But she answered him, yes, Lord,

yet even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs. And he said to her, for saying this, you may go your way. The demon has left your daughter. And she went home, and found the child lying in bed, and the demon gone. Jesus cures a deaf man. Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, through the region of the Decapolis. And they brought to him a man who was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech. And they begged him to lay his hands upon him. And taking him aside from the multitude privately, he put his fingers into his ears. And he spat and touched his tongue.

And looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, And his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. And he charged them to tell no one, but the more he charged them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. And they were astonished beyond measure, saying, He has done all things well. He even makes the deaf hear, and the mute speak. Chapter 8. Feeding the Four Thousand. In those days when again a great crowd had gathered, and they had nothing to eat, he called his disciples to him and said to them, I have compassion on the crowd, because they have been with me now three days and have nothing to eat, and if I send them away hungry

to their homes, they will faint on the way, and some of them have come a long way. And his disciples answered him, How can one feed these men with bread here in the desert? And he asked them, How many loaves have you? They said, Seven. And he commanded the crowd to sit down on the ground. And he took the seven loaves, and having given thanks, he broke them, and gave them to his disciples to set before the people, and they set them before the crowd. And they had a few small fish, and having blessed them, he commanded that these also should be set before them. And they had a few small fish, and having blessed them, he commanded that these also should be set before them. And they ate, and were satisfied, and they took up the broken pieces left over seven baskets full. And there were about four thousand people, and he sent them away.

And immediately he got into a boat with his disciples, and went to the district of Damanuthah. The demand for a sign. The Pharisees came and began to argue with him, seeking from him a sign from heaven to test him. And he sighed deeply in his spirit and said, Why does this generation seek a sign? Truly, I say to you, no sign shall be given to this generation. And he left them, and getting into the boat boat again he departed to the other side the leaven of the pharisees and of herod now they had forgotten to bring bread and they had only one loaf with them in the boat and he cautioned them saying take heed beware of the leaven of the pharisees and the leaven

of herod and they discussed it with one another saying we have no bread and being aware of it jesus said to them why do you discuss the fact that you have no bread? 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? When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?

They said to him, Twelve. And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up? They said to him, Twelve. And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up? And they said to him, Seven. And he said to them, Do you not yet understand? Jesus cures a blind man at Bethsaida. And they came to Bethsaida, and some people brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him. And he took the blind Verse 1. Peter's declaration that Jesus is the Christ. And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. And on the way he asked his disciples, Who do men say that I am?

And they told him, And he asked them, Peter answered him, Jesus foretells his death and resurrection. And he began to teach them that the Son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed. And after three days rise again. And he said this plainly and Peter took him and began to rebuke him, but turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, get behind me, Satan, for you are not on the side of God, but of men.

And he called to him the multitude with his disciples and said to them, If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospels will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? For what can a man give in return for his life? For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed, when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels. Psalm 23, The Divine Shepherd, a Psalm of David.

The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for you are with me. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil. My cup overflows.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Father in heaven, we give you praise and we thank you. We thank you so much for being our divine shepherd, our good shepherd. Thank you so much for being the one who guides us, especially as we walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Lord God, that is what this world is. That's what life is. It is known as the veil of tears. It is known as the valley of the shadow

of death. And yet we can say like David, I fear no evil. Why? Because you're with me, because you were with us, your rod and your staff that comfort us. And Lord God, you can only be our good shepherd. Really? If we, if we are your sheep, if we allow you And Lord God, you can only be our good shepherd, really, if we are your sheep, if we allow you to direct us, if we allow you to guide us, if we allow you to protect us. But when we go wandering away from you, then not only are we left alone, not only are we vulnerable, not only are we in the valley of the shadow of death with no protection. We know that even then, we know that even then you come in search of us. David didn't know this. The ancient patriarchs, the prophets, they didn't know this as clearly as we know this because Lord God, through your son, Jesus Christ,

you revealed that you're the one who seeks out the lost sheep. You're the one who, when we do wander, you go in pursuit of us, desperately seeking us, because you have declared that for whatever reason, whatever reason, you love us and you pursue us even when we wander far from you. So, Lord God, pursue us. Now, if we've wandered, pursue us like the good shepherd that you are and lead us back so that we may dwell in the house of the Lord forever, all the days of our lives. In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Okay. Gosh, man, oh man. We have this, the Gospel of Mark, again, so good. He is, I mean, have you been counting how many times he's noted immediately? So it's not just Jesus who moves immediately.

It's the woman who moves immediately. It's the people who ask things immediately. And so here we are, the urgency, the quickness of all the characters in the gospel of Mark, because they realize they know that here is the kingdom on earth right now. Jesus is with them. So let's dive into this. In chapter seven, we have this teaching of Jesus where he talks about how the Pharisees are watching him and they noticed that his disciples do not wash their hands on coming from the market or wash your hands before they eat. Now, this is not a matter of sanitation. This is not a matter of cleanliness. This is a matter of ritual purity, right? So

remember back in the Old Testament, we have, if you're serving at the altar, then you would wash your hands in a certain way. You'd have ritual purity. Now, if that's a good thing for the altar, the thought would go, if that's good for the worship of God in the temple, well, then we all should do this. If it's good for the priests, those who are serving in the temple of God, to purify themselves before they undertake these tasks, then yeah, that'd be great for us to do. And so it's not a bad initial thought, but that's where the thought comes from is, okay, the priests are commanded to do this before they worship. Let's all do this before we eat because it's a sign of like, even this eating is a worship, you know? So keep in mind, this is not a bad idea, but it's been distorted, right? It's been distorted to have it be the situation where

I've done these things on the outside. I don't have to do the work on the inside. I've transformed my behavior on the outside, but my heart interiorly has not been converted. And that's the distinction. The distinction that Jesus continually makes is the distinction not of you're doing these things on the outside that's bad. It's you're doing these things on the outside without having your inside being conformed to what those things on the outside were meant to do. Now, there is some things that are bad. And he points this out.

He says, you have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition. For example, the commandment is honor your father and your mother. And yet you would say that no, that whatever help I would give to my mom and dad is now korban, which means dedicated to God. So the idea would be this. It is your responsibility. It's our responsibilities to take care of our aged parents. Like that's just, that's a given that is so clear through the Bible. That is so clear in the teachings of God that it's our responsibility, to the degree that we're able, to take care of our aging or aged parents, right?

Take care of those who are vulnerable, particularly those to whom we're related, particularly those who cared for us in our youths. So we are connected. We have to take care of each other. But what people were doing back in the day is they were saying, well, here's what I've done, is whatever money I would have spent to take care of my parents, I'm dedicating that to God. And so mom and dad here, rather than care for you in your old age, you can know that there's an endowment that's been made in your name at over at the temple. Like that kind of idea is, is so I don't have to care for you now because I've made this donation

to the temple and, but it's in your name. And so I get to basically exempt myself from the work of serving, from the work of taking care of the commandment and fulfilling that commandment of caring for one's parents. So that's hopefully we can understand that that's the key that Jesus is saying. And he says you do many things like this. There's a lot of things that God was very, very clear about the fact that this is what I'm calling you to do. And you're going to do a version of that.

But the version of that is actually a way to avoid doing the thing that God has asked us to do. And that's a thing that all of us continue to struggle with, whether that's like a church tradition or a church discipline or a thing we just even interiorly end up doing is we could say, okay, I know that the right thing to do is for me to, let's go back to parents. If you have your parents who are living, it might be a situation where actually, you know, the right thing to do, maybe it's not necessarily provide for their care because, you know, who knows, whatever your situation is, circumstances, it might actually be that they need nursing staff. That might be a necessity, that kind of a thing. But maybe it's, you know what, I could drive to visit my mom and dad, call up one of my parents

and just spend time with them on the phone. Well, that's, that's fine. I know that that's probably what they would appreciate the most might actually help them the most, but you know, I'd rather do something else. I'll do this other thing and say that that we'll call it good. And again, we do that with our spiritual lives. We do that when it comes to taking care of family, taking care of each other. We always have ability to substitute something we're not actually called to do instead of the thing we're actually called to do. And so Jesus is pointing that out and indicting all of us when we are tempted to do that. Now, moving on, here is the story in chapter 7 about the Syrophoenician woman's faith,

which can be troubling to a lot of us because here is Jesus who not only, she has this woman, Syrophoenician, right? So Syrophoenician simply means that, um, that simply means it she's from the region of Tyre and she's a Greek. So she's not a Jew. And, um, but she's from the same region of Jesus as Jesus. So this is, this is simply a, she belongs to a different religion and she's not necessarily the same bloodline as the Jewish people, but it's, it's not necessarily a, um, it's not a matter of her being a woman. It's not a matter of her being a foreigner. It's a matter of her not being Jewish. And this is the big, big key because it seems like, my gosh, Jesus is not necessarily the kindest to her

in apparently at least because why she has a woman, a daughter who is possessed by a demon. And she says the demon from my daughter. And Jesus says to her, let the children be fed first, for it's not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs. Now you can say, wait, did you just call her a dog? And in some ways you'd say, I mean, yes, but also no, because in our translation, it just says dogs. And we recognize that dogs could be a really big insult. Our dogs could be a descriptor. What I mean by descriptor is he doesn't say you are a dog. What he says is it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.

Dogs, in this case, is actually a Greek word that means puppies or means like the pets. It's a word for pets, beloved pets, in fact. And he's saying, you know, when it comes to who gets fed in the household, we have pets and we love them. We have children and we love them more. And so who gets the food first? Well, if it's between the children and the pets, the children get fed first. And so he's not, again, he's not insulting her as much as he's describing what he's about to do. Because why? Jesus came to save the Jews first. And this has to be the case. It's not the Jews exclusively, and that is absolutely clear,

abundantly clear from the way Jesus speaks and the way Jesus acts. He regularly goes out to those who are outside the community of the Jews, but he also emphasizes so, so clearly that salvation in John's gospel, right, in chapter four is from the Jews, but salvation for the whole world through the Jews, right? So salvation for the whole world, for everyone, including the Syrophoenician woman and her daughter, but it's actually going to come from the fulfillment of everything we've been reading, everything that, that the Jewish people had been living in the old covenant in the old Testament. And so he doesn't say, I didn't come for you.

He says, listen, first for the Jews and then you. And what's so good is that the woman, even though Jesus basically essentially sounds like he's saying no, she persists and she persists in humility. It's amazing. She says, yes, she agrees. Like, yeah, I get it. We're not the children of the household, but I know something about you. I know that you come from God and I know something about God because of you Jewish people. And that is that God has a love for all of his, all those who belong to him. And so even

the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs. And Jesus is just so, I mean, this is the contest between humility and entitlement. She doesn't come to Jesus with any sense of entitlement. It doesn't say I deserve to be fed. My child deserves to be healed. She simply says, I know you can, please will you? And he says, I came for the Jews first. Yes, I know, but I trust that you have enough leftover. I trust that in your goodness, you will let that abundance overflow. Give us some of the overflow. And it's so, so powerful because her humility just is, it moves us because this is, we have to realize most of us listening to these scriptures aren't Jews by birth. We're not Jews by our history or by our pedigree. We're Gentiles. We're her. And that's how we approach God too.

We don't approach God with the idea of I deserve this or you owe it to me. We approach God with this no sense of entitlement. I do not deserve your grace. We are all simply just recipients of God's free gift that he did not have to give to us. And that is why the story of the Syrophoenician woman's faith is us. So I can't approach God with pride. I can't approach God with entitlement.

I always approach God like this woman because she's us and I don't deserve any of this, but God, I'm going to persist. I'm going to keep asking because I know I don't deserve it, but I know your heart and your heart is you want all good things. You want to heal. You want to feed. You want to make us your own. And that's exactly what Jesus does. Now, moving on. There's a couple quick notes. We have Jesus curing a deaf man and Jesus curing a blind man. Both times, Jesus touches these two individuals in order to heal them. And this is the power of what we believe is the power of the sacraments, right? Is that Tertullian said this in the first couple centuries

of the church. He says that the flesh is the hinge of salvation, that actual grace, like real, the God's very life is imparted to us through stuff, like through matter, through the material world, that the material world on its own is good as it is. But God actually communicates his spirit. He communicates his grace through the flesh, through the material world. I mean, this is actually the exact reason for the incarnation, right? The incarnation of God himself becomes one of us, becomes incarnated, becomes enfleshed. Why? Because God could have said, I declare you all saved.

He could have said it with his words. He could have just breathed the word. He could have just thought a thought and we could be saved. But he brought us salvation through his body, through his life, death, and resurrection. And then we receive salvation through our bodies as well. That through baptism, water is poured on us

or we are submerged in water and actually does something through the sacraments. We're fed by the very body and blood of Jesus through stuff, right? Through bread and wine that has become his body and blood. And so here, when Jesus cures a deaf man, when he cures the blind man, he touches them. He uses spit, he uses his fingers.

And that there's the sense of the flesh is the hinge of salvation, that real spiritual grace is given to us through actual material things. Now, the material things on their own, again, aren't powerful. It is God's grace working through them. And that's so, so powerful. Moving on. Well, you know, we can talk about the feeding of the 4,000. I did not want to take up too much more of your time because, you know, only three chapters today and yet here we are. But the feeding of the 4,000,

this is not a repeat of the feeding of the 5,000. There is something slightly different about this one. Well, I mean, there's a couple of things different that are important to note. I want to note one thing. And that one thing is, last time Jesus said, what do we have to eat? Well, this small boy here has five loaves and two fish. In this case, Jesus asks his disciples, how many loaves have you? So he's asking them to give their own food. What do you have? Okay, give that now.

Before it was, what can you find, right? Well, the young boy, five loaves, two fish. In this case, all right, how much do you have? And so there's this invitation to offer your own food. We talked about this before. We give God what we have and he takes it, he blesses it, and he distributes it, gives it back to us so we can use it for his glory. We use it for the people around us. But in this case, it's even more personal. It is your own food. And he reminds them of this. And this is the thing that disciples and ourselves, we forget so quickly. They forget, we forget so quickly. And Jesus even says, you basically, you don't understand. He said, what about the five loaves

for the 5,000? How many baskets full? What about seven loaves to the 4,000? How many baskets for? And he's like, you don't yet understand. There are your hearts hardened. Do you not remember? And that's the flight every one of us has is God can do all these things in our lives. He can reveal himself in so many powerful ways. And then we just simply go on to the next thing and forget. That's one of the reasons why I know so many people, when we're listening to the Bible here, you're taking down notes and you're writing these things down. So you do not forget. In fact, there was a man who had written to me. It was maybe in the first two months of this first 60 days of us going through this. He had one line of a takeaway for every single day. And it was day one, this is the

thing I take away. Day two, this is the thing I take away because he knew himself and he knew that just like the disciples, he would also forget. And so here we are. Lastly, the last thing is we're going to talk about this more deeply when we get to the next messianic checkpoint, which is Matthew's gospel. But Jesus brings his disciples to Caesarea Philippi. And he asked the question, who do men say that I am? And they say all across the board, John the Baptist, Elijah, one of the prophets. How do you say, who do you say that I am? And Peter answers, you're the Christ. Then later on, Jesus says, okay, yes. And the son of man must suffer many things, be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. And he said this plainly.

And now, yes, we have the rebuke of Peter, which we can talk about next time. He said, get behind me, Satan. You know, Satan is the accuser. It's the obstacle. You're being a stumbling block to me. You're not thinking as God does, but as human beings do. This is what he's saying to Peter. Yes, Peter is an obstacle in this way because he is rebuking Jesus. Imagine rebuking your rabbi. Imagine that rabbi being God himself.

Think again, Peter. But here is Peter saying that that can't happen. God forbid that this would happen to you. Again, we'll talk about this more in Matthew chapter 16. But here, Jesus is making it very clear. Yes, that is who I am. I am the Messiah. I am the Christ. And the son of man must suffer many things, be rejected by the elders, chief priests, and the scribes be killed three days rise again. And then he goes on so clearly. And if you would come after me, then you have to deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me. And this is so, so important, especially for our day and age. You know, the whole point of this Bible in a year

is, as I said yesterday or the day before, we're trying to get a biblical worldview. And the biblical worldview is that the disciples of Jesus are going to suffer for the sake of Jesus. We are not going to fit in to the world. It goes on to say, whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the son of man also be ashamed. You think how many times our culture, our world thinks that what we believe as Christians is backwards, is outdated, is just ignore it. And how many times as Christians in our world are we tempted to go more with the world than we are with Jesus? And this is so critical for us because we don't live in a Christian world. We live in a post-Christian world. When we lived in a Christian world, when most of at least the

West was Christianized and people around us were more or less at least kind of believed and looked at the world in a similar way, then yeah, it wasn't necessarily difficult or you wouldn't risk anything necessarily by saying, oh no, I believe what the Bible teaches. I believe what Jesus teaches about this, that, or the other issue. But in a world that has left those things behind, man, we have what? You have families who no longer talk to each other because some of the members of the families believe what the world teaches and some members of the family believe what God teaches. And so this is so, so critical that Jesus is saying, okay, this is the deal. I'm going to suffer greatly. I'm going to suffer from people that should have actually recognized

me first. I'm going to suffer. I'm going to be overwhelmed by death. I'm going to be crucified. And you, if you're going to follow me, you also will follow that path. This is the invitation and the conditions for discipleship. And we can't belong to Jesus without that. We can't belong to Jesus without it. And no amount of trying to change what he has said, no amount of trying to change what the church has always taught is ever going to help. What's going to help is grace. What's going to help is courage. What's going to help is that biblical worldview that we're all praying for and listening to these words of God for is that hopefully not only will our worldview be shaped by a biblical lens, but also our hearts will be sharpened.

Our hearts will become strengthened. Our hearts will be more courageous so that we can boldly and lovingly proclaim Christ to a world that has forgotten who he is. So we need prayers. We need to pray for each other. We need to pray for ourselves. And I am praying for you. Please, please pray for me.

My name is Father Mike. I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless.