Mark 2:12

And immediately he arose,....

His calling of Matthew from the receipt of custom, and his eating, upon that occasion, with publicans and sinners, and justifying himself in so doing,

This passage shows our Lord once more at Capernaum. Once more we find Him doing His accustomed work, preaching the word, and healing those that were sick. We see, in these verses, what great spiritual privileges some people enjoy, and yet make no use of them . This is a truth which is strikingly illustrated by the history of Capernaum. No city in Palestine appears to have enjoyed so much of our Lord's presence, during His earthly ministry, as did this city. It was the place where He dwelt, after He left Nazareth. (Matt. 4:13.)

In Matthew (Mt 9:8) it is, "They marvelled, and glorified God, which had given such power unto men." At forgiving power they wondered not, but that a man, to all appearance like one of themselves, should possess it!

This passage shows our Lord once more at Capernaum. Once more we find Him doing His accustomed work, preaching the word, and healing those that were sick. We see, in these verses, what great spiritual privileges some people enjoy, and yet make no use of them . This is a truth which is strikingly illustrated by the history of Capernaum. No city in Palestine appears to have enjoyed so much of our Lord's presence, during His earthly ministry, as did this city. It was the place where He dwelt, after He left Nazareth. (Matt. 4:13.) It was the place where many of His miracles were worked, and many of His sermons delivered. But nothing that Jesus said or did seems to have had any effect on the hearts of the inhabitants. They crowded to hear Him, as we read in this passage, "until there was no room about the door." They were amazed. They were astonished. They were filled with wonder at His mighty works. But they were not converted. They lived in the full noon-tide blaze of the Sun of Righteousness, and yet their hearts remained hard. And they drew from our Lord the heaviest condemnation that He ever pronounced against any place, except Jerusalem — "And you people of Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? No, you will be brought down to the place of the dead. For if the miracles I did for you had been done in Sodom, it would still be here today. I assure you, Sodom will be better off on the judgment day than you." (Matt. 11:23, 24) It is good for us all to mark well this case of Capernaum. We are all apt to suppose that it needs nothing but the powerful preaching of the Gospel to convert people's souls, and that if the Gospel is only brought into a place everybody must believe. We forget the amazing power of unbelief, and the depth of man's enmity against God.

IT is very natural that there should be many surprising things in the Gospel, for it is remarkable beyond measure that there should be a Gospel at all. As soon as I begin thinking of it I exclaim with Bunyan, "O world of wonders, I can say no less." And I invite you all to join with the multitude in saying with the text, "We never saw it on this fashion."

IT is very natural that there should be many surprising things in the Gospel, for it is remarkable beyond measure that there should be a Gospel at all. As soon as I begin thinking of it I exclaim with Bunyan, "O world of wonders, I can say no less." And I invite you all to join with the multitude in saying with the text, "We never saw it on this fashion." When man had sinned, God might instantly have destroyed our rebel race, or He might have permitted it to exist as the fallen angels do—in a state of enmity to all goodness and in consequent misery. But He who passed the angels by took up the seed of Abraham and looked upon man—that insignificant item in the ranks of creatureship and determined that man should experience salvation and show forth His Divine Grace. It was a wonderful thing, to begin with, that there should be a Gospel for men. And when we remember that the Gospel involved the gift of the only-begotten Son of God. When we remember that it was necessary that God, the invisible Spirit, should be veiled in human flesh. When we think about the fact that the Son of God should become the son of Mary, should be subject to pain and weakness, poverty and shame—when we remember all this, we may expect to find great wonders clustering round such a stupendous fact! Beholding God in human flesh, miracles no longer strike us as being at all marvelous, for the Incarnation of God outmiracles miracle! But we must further remember that in order to bring the Gospel to us it was necessary that God should, in our nature, offer Atonement for human sin.