Sermon Notes: Mark 1:21-28
Mark 1:21-28
I need you give me some latitude in this introduction to set us up for future texts that Mark will assume we have a framework of knowledge about, like he does for our text today. So, we’ll set the foundation for that information in the introduction today, which will help us today, but will be the foundation for the specific information next week.
I promise you I’m working to help it all dovetail together.
Here we go.
Bible reading is not hard. Bible study is more challenging because we are trying to answer questions we may have about what we read.
We can read, and we can understand the author’s intent by good reading skill and the help of the Holy Spirit. The Bible alone is sufficient to lead us to Jesus, grow our faith, and help us obey the Lord. Sola Scriptura! NOT Solo Scriptura.
Example: The Bible teaches us the Tri-une nature of God but not quantum physics. The Bible does not teach the equations for calculating such but does give me the framework to know the Creator of such equations. Just because God did not see fit to tell all things about creation in the Bible does not mean their reality is untrue.
All over the world, men, women, and children who get access to the Bible will rightly conclude from Scripture alone that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life and that no one comes to the Father but by him. They go deep in their faith. They learn to hear the voice of the Spirit and obey God.
The word of God is powerful.
Simultaneously, as we feast on the Scriptures, working our way through the Bible multiple times we start seeing “things” that somehow, we missed the last time through.
The word of God is living and active, and God won’t let us miss what he gave us to feast on if we really want to know him and his word more.
In this discipline, the Bible will meet us with the strange, the odd, and the weird. We find those things tucked into words, sentences, even people (Melchizedek or the witch at Endor who conjures up Samuel who is described in Hebrew as an “Elohim”), events, and ideas, that we want to make sense of.
We should not believe the cop out that God doesn’t want us to understand those things. God saw fit to have it inspired in the text and preserved it for us, so he must want us to understand what is there. Sometimes that requires us to dig and ask some critical thinking questions.
What has not happened is that men like me have not helped God’s people make sense of those things because it’s easier to skip over them rather than have to know and explain them.
Together we breathe the air of ideologies, culture influenced by ideologies, history, and cultural historical trends that are not merely the trends of men.
We wrestle not against flesh and blood.
When the enlightenment influenced thinkers proclaimed, “God is dead”, ideas began to shift. That 3-word sentence shifted culture, science, history, government, economics, education, and even theology. The result is that mankind began to doubt the existence of God and his created forces of good and evil. Western civilization used to believe in, assume, and account for these realities in their rhythms of life.
Before long entire systems no longer accounted for God or his dimension of heaven. They completely jettisoned what they came to consider an ancient and useless idea of an unseen God and forces beyond earthly creation. So, they relegated God to theology and marginalized that discipline to its own building.
The “death of God” led to the disciplines of creation being divorced from their purpose in theology.
Materialism became the religion that replaced the Christianity. It has even become a “god” absorbed by the church.
Materialism as a religion caused us to value pragmatic disciplines and outcomes. That means that unless something has a tangible immediate result, there is not much use for it.
Example: Most churches are more concerned with numerical growth rather than depth.
Educationally that leads to the system ditching classical education models that emphasize classical literature, the arts of rhetoric and logic, and critical thinking. We replaced those with merely skills-based disciplines designed to produce a vocational outcomes.
It’s not that skills based pragmatic disciplines are bad. They are glorious and created good Jesus made for us to master while informed by the knowledge of God and his unseen reality first. But when they are not informed by the classical understanding of their Godward purpose beyond physical creation, they become tools that distract and blind minds to keep them from seeing the reality of unseen things.
The study and knowledge of God and the dimension of heaven (theology) as reality and the foundation of truth is the chief discipline. Without that study, the rest of our study in creation is incomplete.
Now, what was that for?
This: John Mark’s audience does not have that disadvantage. They are firmly aware of the unseen and articulate it in their mythologies that make up most of classical literature. They do NOT see these mythologies as untrue stories, but the non-literal way the nations on earth communicated their history and theology.
You probably never learned that in your lit class, and that might have been intentional, because when “God is dead”, you don’t need to consider that mythology is anything but fanciful stories.
John Mark does not explain some things we may discount because he assumes we know them. He assumes that knowledge under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
That happens a lot in the Bible. What that means is that the Lord assumes that we have an understanding of the knowledge sitting in the background of Mark’s audience.
If the Lord assumes this, then when we have questions about the text we don’t have immediate answers for, we must go looking for answers to them. If they are not found immediately in the text of the Bible, we have to dig around into what the folks in the Bible were reading or taught and believed to be true.
Our lack of knowing is not the Bible or the Holy Spirit’s fault. The Bible’s weird and strange texts should shake us awake to the fact that there is more to what God has done than our materialist worldview has allowed us to see.
The questions are the Spirit’s nudging to dig!
We lost in western civilization what John Mark, influenced by the Spirit, assumes his audience knows in this titanic struggle between God and the forces of evil in the heavenly places.
If we are going to hear and understand all that John Mark’s audience understood, we may have to get uncomfortable as we deal with what he wrote. We can know what they believed, and people like me are going to have to do better at teaching it and leading you to go find it yourself.
We have a nice opportunity I was able to work out for us this week with Logos Bible Software to help you search and dig. We’ll send you some information this week about that.
I’m not going to drop too much on you today. This here introduction is intended to lay a foundation for that data.
Mark is going to hit is with an “unclean spirit” quickly into his work without any explanation, and we have to identify these things in order to make sense of what Jesus does, why he does it, and what he gives us to do regarding those things. Yes, we have a role to play in dealing with them too. All of us. If you even believe they are real. If the religion of materialism didn’t steal that knowledge from you like seeds plucked from the path by the stealer of seeds. Those who have ears, hear.
We’ll address that as we go along.
The appendix I prepared for today has part of next week’s sermon already written to help us identify what an unclean spirit is. If you want to get a head start, you can skip to the appendix for that later.
Let’s read our text: Mark 1:21-28
What do we see?
1. Jesus is on a mission to teach God’s word with authority. V. 21-22
Jesus begins at the synagogue. The Jewish synagogue was an assembly place where the Torah and other parts of the Old Testament, would be read and exposited. The person in charge of the synagogue was a man called the “ruler of the synagogue”.
We’ll meet a synagogue ruler in a few chapters named Jairus. His job was to manage the library, worship, clean up, and even serve as a teacher of children. The ruler of the synagogue was not the teacher of the Torah. That job fell to the men who were members of the synagogue, had some training, were older and respected, and of good moral character, or a guest rabbi.
In Capernaum at the synagogue, Mark’s theme of “immediately” greets us. That signals to us that Mark is emphasizing a first principle. Jesus is not just wandering around hoping for an opportunity. Jesus intentionally chooses this assembly of God-fearing people to preach his word to.
Jesus enters for worship and the ruler of the synagogue apparently asks Jesus to select a text and expound on it.
Why did the ruler ask Jesus? We don’t know. It doesn’t say. Maybe it was because Jesus was the guest rabbi. I’d like to imagine he was compelled from deep within his soul because his Creator was there in the flesh like he came to Abraham in Genesis 18, and he asked Jesus because of a deep compelling.
Regardless, the Son of God selects his passage and teaches with authority.
John Mark says that the people are astonished. The word “astonished” means to be “struck by force”. This word is a powerful word. The striking implies that a person is “struck” to the edge of their senses. Imagine that scene at Jesus’ arrest when he speaks and people fall down. Like that.
Mark does not tell us if Jesus’ observed authority is because he appeals to his own interpretation, like Matthew records Jesus doing rather than quoting the oral traditions or the scribe’s commentaries on the passage, or if his authority just pulses off him as the Creator of the universe is standing there expounding his own word.
Either way, Jesus’ authority is so powerful that the people are struck.
There is an awe and wonder produced in creatures as the creature’s Creator the Son of God teaches his word.
It is this dynamic that undergirds the Bible’s insistence on preaching God’s word and the power of the Holy Spirit in the preaching of God’s word. When God’s people expound God’s word empowered by the Holy Spirit, there is power available that Jesus will do in that place what he did when he opened his word and taught it.
This is the work of the Spirit to convict, to strike by force, a person or group of people to awaken them to their need for salvation and righteousness and to walk by faith.
I always pray that the Spirit would take his word and strike our hearts alive to him and his kingdom like he did here in Capernaum. He can and does do that when the people gather and his word is read and expounded.
2. Jesus chooses the synagogue to display his authority. V. 21
Jesus chooses the synagogue likely because he chose Abraham and his faithful descendants to be the missionary enterprise to the nations. So, he goes to Abraham’s people to show them that the One they were looking for has arrived. There is a divine order Jesus is operating in.
Paul alludes to this in Romans 1:16: Romans 1:16 (ESV) 16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
Perhaps, also, Jesus chooses the synagogue because it is a strategic way of reaching the people.
The synagogue would be a hub of sending information as the people went home and told what they saw and heard.
3. Jesus’ authoritative teaching confronts an unclean spirit that has taken a man captive, and Jesus powerfully casts the unclean spirit out of the man. V. 23-26
Mark will use “unclean spirit” and “demon” interchangeably. I put a list of the instances in Mark’s work that shows how he uses them interchangeably for you to see. So, an unclean spirit is a demon, and a demon is an unclean spirit.
HINT: What makes something unclean? Leviticus shows the reader that an improper mixing of things makes the resulting creation unclean.[1] Demons are the result of mixing beings God set boundaries for not mixing, thus the inspired writers of the New Testament interchangeably call the demons “unclean spirits”. So, it will be a good idea to get rid of the idea that demons are fallen angels. Mark did not believe that nor did his audience.
I’m not going to identify just yet what a demon is. That’s in the appendix as well, and we’ll talk about that next week as I mentioned in the introduction.
Like Will Smith told Kevin James in Hitch we need to “keep it right here” for now: Jesus, as the Son of God, authoritatively expounding his word naturally confronts the unclean spirit that has captivated one of Jesus’ image bearing creatures.
What does this mean?
2.1 It means unclean spirits are real, and their influence is never questioned in the Bible Jesus just deals with them and those who follow him and receive the Holy Spirit deal with them as well.
This includes us. Yes, we have things to learn and eyes that need to be awakened to this.
What does this mean?
2.2 It is a strange commentary on the spiritual situation in Capernaum that a man with a demon could worship in the synagogue with no sense of incompatibility until confronted by Jesus, and indeed apparently with no initial desire to be delivered from his condition.[2]
This man and his demon were just part of the synagogue. Did the people in the synagogue know?
We don’t know if this man was known to be demonized or not. What they were doing did not disturb the unclean spirit. It just got along fine with what was happening. That is disturbing.
Either way, Jesus’ authoritative preaching of his word confronts the demon, and it prompts the unclean spirit to speak in fear through his demonized human subject.
This demon knows Jesus is the Son of God, and in fear wonders if the appointed judgment he clearly knows about is imminent. The demon knows more than we know at this point. That little nugget should make us wonder what all that we might need to learn.
If the demons know who Jesus is and if the unclean spirits know the outcome of those who are on the side of the Serpent, then all people need to know.
Thus, Mark is writing to make sure his audience knows Jesus is the Son of God, and those who side with the Serpent have a judgment awaiting them like the demons.
Jesus’ word with the help of the Holy Spirit will confront evil and evil will recoil and fight back.
Jesus has supreme authority as Creator and author of his word. Thus, all people everywhere are called on to acknowledge who Jesus is in faith, repent for the rebellion, and follow Jesus.
4. Jesus’ authority as the Son of God is so powerful that all are amazed and news about him begins to spread, but... V. 27-28
The Greek text makes the “all” emphatic. Everyone was amazed. It’s not the amazement. It’s that everyone was amazed.
What Mark is emphasizing here is not the intensity of people’s response like in verse 22, but that every person gathered there was astonished. Everyone. All of them.
It’s possible that not everyone was “struck” in verse 22 by Jesus’ teaching. The emphasis is on the intensity of the effect of Jesus’ teaching. It just says “they” were astonished.
Here, it’s not the intensity. Mark uses a different word. Mark’s emphasis is that all of them have now been moved by the events.
They are decedents of Abraham. They are people of the law. They know what a demon is. They know the stories.
I believe this is important because the fact that most, maybe all, experienced being struck to the edge of their senses by Jesus’ teaching, then all of them were amazed that he commands unclean spirits, is going to be countered with the coming harsh reality that many of them who experience this glory will reject Jesus.
Religious. Spiritual. Supernaturally aware. Present. Yet when it counts the most, many who were struck and astonished will completely reject the truth.
It makes sense. They had a man with an unclean spirit, and it wasn’t a thing until Jesus confronted it. They just got along with the demon or were ignorant due to the deceptive nature of the unclean spirit.
We should not be surprised that when faith matters most it will be opposed.
Mark’s account makes me step back and evaluate myself and my environment.
I’ve been moved to transformation by the powerful work of the good news, struck by his power, and when it counts, will I go away or just be like, “so what”? Will I be discerning to the work of unclean spirits or just get along with them?
When doubt assails me and the forces of evil accuse me before the Father and I feel that accusation, will I crumble under the test?
When going about life, will my faith supply discernment to see and command unclean spirits?
Application
1. Jesus is the Divine Son of God, Ruler of all things, believe that and continue to believe that.
If you have not believed, believe today.
If you have believed, let his word help you stay the course.
The Serpent will come after your faith. He targets faith. Listen to how Paul makes this case:
1 Thessalonians 3:1-5 (ESV) 1 Therefore when we could bear it no longer, we were willing to be left behind at Athens alone, 2 and we sent Timothy, our brother and God’s coworker in the gospel of Christ, to establish and exhort you in your faith, 3 that no one be moved by these afflictions. (So, it is faith that keeps us from being moved by suffering) For you yourselves know that we are destined for this. 4 For when we were with you, we kept telling you beforehand that we were to suffer affliction, just as it has come to pass, and just as you know. 5 For this reason, when I could bear it no longer, I sent to learn about your faith, for fear that somehow the tempter had tempted you and our labor would be in vain.
So, Paul needed to know about their faith that keep them from being moved, but since the enemy wants to move them away from Jesus, what does he tempt that, if successful, would allow him to move them away from Jesus? Their faith!
If you are tempted away from faith, from your trust in Jesus, it is the Serpent at work.
If you have believed, don’t let the temptation to distrust Jesus hang around. It is that faith that will keep you from being moved, therefore, the Serpent wants to tempt you away from that faith. So, don’t let him.
Let today’s text snap you out of it. Jesus is the Son of God, and his word is powerful and his authority is effective.
Keep on. Don’t stop.
Be like Peter when Jesus asked them if they wanted to abandon him like the crowds: “Where are we going to go? You have the words of life!”
2. Worship Jesus for his authority.
If you are in Christ this morning, he has given you his Spirit as the glorious deposit that guarantees our inheritance of the earth as sons and daughters of God. That is Jesus’ authority at work for you.
He has given you his word. He has given you authority over unclean spirits.
Worship him!
3. Let the authority of Jesus help you if your faith is weak.
Later, John Mark will tell us about Jesus casting a demon out of a boy. The disciples could not cast this one out. There is an argument among the scribes and the disciples. The argument seems to be centered on the disciples not being able to deal with the demon.
When Jesus asks the disciples what they were arguing about with the scribes, the man who brought his son for help speaks up and tells Jesus the story.
Jesus asks the dad to bring his son and inquires what the problem is. Then the dad says this: Mark 9:22 (ESV) “But if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.”
You can hear the fading hope, the tired searching, and the last grasp at a solution in his words.
Jesus replies: Mark 9:23 (ESV) 23 “’If you can’! All things are possible for one who believes.’”
Then the dad cries out: Mark 9:24 (ESV) “I believe; help my unbelief!”
There is something about suffering, regardless of the degree of the suffering, that wears faith out. It gets us to this place of belief but doubt that our belief is any good.
Perhaps your faith is weak, and you listened to this account of Jesus’ authority in his word and his authority over unclean spirits, and you don’t feel it or see it effective for you. You start to think that perhaps God doesn’t want to see or care to help. So, you despair.
That’s normal when your worn out and you don’t understand why and also understand you may never know why.
Hear me: We feel you and we get you. More that Jesus sees you, and let the truth that Jesus’ word is living, active, powerful, life giving, and that he sees and knows help you rest. Let the truth that he has all authority over evil wash over you with a confidence that we can, in his name, take authority over evil and he can and he will sustain us and keep us and make all things right in his good time for our good. We don’t have to know why. We just need to know that Jesus plants his footsteps in the sea and he rides upon the storm. You fearful saints, fresh courage take, the clouds you so much dread are big with mercy and will break in blessing on your head.
It’s ok to cry out, “I believe. Help my unbelief.” That is a prayer of faith.
Let these words give you rest, joy, and strength, and thus take his yoke of rest on you and let him by his authority pull the weight for you as you walk with him.
4. Let his word and Holy Spirit give you eyes to see the spiritual battle raging around you and help to engage it well.
5. Pray: Make your word a lamp for our feet and light for our path / Sustain our faith / Help us take authority over evil in your name / Increase us / Help us be holy / Send us
Appendix
In the Gospel of Mark, the words translated as "demon" (daimonion), and "unclean spirit" (akathartos and pneumatic) refer to the same non-terrestrial beings of the dimension the Triune Creator inhabits. It is these beings Jesus and his disciples confront and take authority over to stop their demonization of people.
Occurrences of “unclean spirit”:
Mark 1:23: A man with an unclean spirit in the synagogue cries out to Jesus.
Mark 1:26: The unclean spirit, after convulsing the man, comes out with a loud cry.
Mark 1:27: Jesus commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.
Mark 3:11: The unclean spirits, whenever they saw Jesus, fell down and cried out.
Mark 3:30: The scribes accused Jesus of having an unclean spirit.
Mark 5:2: A man with an unclean spirit from the tombs meets Jesus.
Mark 5:8: Jesus commands the unclean spirit to come out of the man.
Mark 5:13: The unclean spirits enter the pigs and drown in the sea.
Mark 7:25: A woman's daughter had an unclean spirit.
Mark 9:25: Jesus rebukes the unclean spirit, commanding it to come out and never return.
Occurrences of "Demon" (daimonion). This word comes from ancient Greek concept of supernatural beings and is used more directly for evil beings.
Mark 1:34: Jesus healed many and cast out many demons; he would not let the demons speak.
Mark 1:39: Jesus preached in synagogues and cast out demons.
Mark 3:15: Jesus gave the Twelve authority to drive out demons.
Mark 3:22: Scribes accused Jesus of being possessed by Beelzebul, the prince of demons, and casting out demons by that power.
Mark 6:13: The disciples cast out many demons and anointed the sick.
Mark 7:26: A woman begs Jesus to cast the demon out of her daughter.
Mark 7:29: Jesus tells the woman the demon has left her daughter.
Mark 7:30: The woman finds the demon gone from her daughter.
Mark 9:38: John reports seeing someone driving out demons in Jesus' name.
Mark 16:9: Refers to Jesus appearing to Mary after the resurrection and identifies which Mary by referring to the Mary from whom he cast out seven demons.
Mark 16:17: Refers to the signs that will follow those who follow Jesus: They will cast out demons.
Mark will switch between “unclean spirit” and “demon” in the same story without distinction. You can see those instances here:
Mark 1:23-39: Starts with an unclean spirit in the synagogue (1:23-27), then shifts to casting out demons generally (1:34, 39).
Mark 3:11-30: Unclean spirits recognize Jesus (3:11), authority is given over demons (3:15), accusations involve the ruler of demons (3:22), and it ends with an unclean spirit (3:30).
Mark 5:1-20: Exclusively uses unclean spirits for the Legion story, but parallels other gospels (e.g., Matthew 8:28-34) that use demons.
Mark 6:7-13: Jesus gives authority over unclean spirits (6:7), but the disciples cast out demons (6:13).
Mark 7:25-30: The daughter's affliction is first called an unclean spirit (7:25), then repeatedly a demon (7:26, 29, 30)—a clear example of synonymous usage in one pericope.
Mark 9:17-38: A boy's condition is described as a spirit making him mute (9:17), rebuked as an unclean spirit (9:25), while elsewhere someone is seen driving out demons (9:38).
Mixing and uncleanness in Leviticus
In Leviticus, uncleanness (ritual impurity) deals with separation, holiness, and avoiding confusion or chaos. Certain prohibitions against mixing highlight how blending categories or elements can lead to defilement or uncleanness, symbolizing a breach of God's ordained order.
Mixing in Agriculture and Animal Husbandry
Leviticus 19:19 (ESV) 19 “You shall keep my statutes. You shall not let your cattle breed with a different kind. You shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed, nor shall you wear a garment of cloth made of two kinds of material.
This instruction prohibits crossbreeding, which was seen as creating hybrids that blur boundaries, rendering the animals or their use impure in a ritual sense.
Interpretations suggest this maintains distinct categories to reflect Israel's separation from other nations, with violations implying defilement.
Mixing regarding Clothing (Leviticus 19:19)
Wearing garments of mixed fabrics: "Nor shall you wear a garment of cloth made of two kinds of material" (often interpreted as wool and linen). This admixture was considered impure, crossing boundaries in a way that violated purity codes.
Mixing regarding Sexual Relations (Leviticus 11:3-8; 9-12; 20-23; 41-44; 18:23-24)
Bestiality (mixing human and animal): This explicitly states that such mixing causes uncleanness, as it perverts natural categories and defiles both the individual and the land.
These laws emphasize spiritual purity over physical hygiene, teaching Israel to embody separation from sin and pagan influences. Note that similar ideas appear in Deuteronomy (Example: 22:9-11 explicitly calls mixed seeds "defiled").
What are demons?
In Michael Heiser's book “Demons: What the Bible Really Says About the Powers of Darkness”, he concludes that demons are not fallen angels. That idea is a widespread popular misconception with no direct biblical support. Heiser argues that demons are the disembodied spirits of the Nephilim who are the hybrid offspring of the rebellious “sons of God” and human women in Genesis 6:1–4.
These disembodied spirits, released when the giants were killed at the flood and afterward (like Goliath at the hands of David), are the “unclean spirits”, “evil spirits”, or “demons” of the New Testament Gospels.
Because of the rebellious nature of their creation and breaking of boundaries the Lord set up in the species of creatures he created, these beings are evil and always seek to inhabit or harass humans in their bodies, cause sickness, disease, and oppression. These unclean spirits operate within the Serpent Dragon’s subversive, temporary, and rebellious (little k) kingdom as part of the powers of darkness that Paul says we are at war with in spiritual conflict.
We wrestle not against flesh and blood.
This helps us make more sense of Jesus’ words in Matthew 12:43-45: Matthew 12:43-45 (ESV) 43 “When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none. 44 Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order. 45 Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also will it be with this evil generation.”
Heiser roots his conclusion in the Bible’s ancient near eastern worldview as well Second Temple Jewish texts found in the Dead Sea Scrolls such as Jubilees and Enoch.
NOTE: If Peter and Jude quote those books it means they found their content acceptable at least in part even though they did not consider them to be “Bible”. That means we can also explore the content of those writings and make connections as we need to in order to help us make sense of the worldview of the inspired biblical authors so we can share their presuppositions.
Demons are distinct from the original Serpent Dragon in Eden, the sons of God who transgressed their created order to infect the seed of the woman with the seed of the Serpent to thwart God’s good news from Genesis 3:15, and the Babel rebellion (Deuteronomy 32:8–9; Ps 82).
Heiser does a fantastic job of unpacking the original language, exegeting biblical texts, and disseminating the worldviews of the biblical world rather than passing on assumptive pop theology.
Thus demons, through the rebellion, are a distinct category in the spiritual dimension that is multi-layered and all ultimately under the Lord’s sovereignty and subject to Christ’s authority, and since we are in Christ, subject to our authority in Christ.
[1] See appendix for examples from Leviticus.
[2] R. Alan Cole, Mark: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 2, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1989), 114–115.