My 10-year old son has been reading in the gospel of Mark. He asked me if we could read Mark 5 together. In Chapter 5, we see the encounter Jesus has with the demoniac in the country of the Gadarenes. He has a power encounter with this man and casts out Legion, the horde of demons who had the man bound for years living among the tombs. This man is completely restored by the power of God into his right mind and goes around giving God glory and sharing his testimony of Jesus Christ. In this same chapter, we see Jesus heal a woman with a blood issue without doing a thing, but simply walking by and being the object of a woman's faith to be healed. Later in the same chapter, we see Jesus have compassion on a man's young daughter who was sick and died; Jesus brought her back to life. When I asked my son to summarize what he read and what he learned from Chapter 5 of Mark, he said, "This chapter is all about the power of God."
In John 14:12, Jesus tells His disciples that the works that He had been performing, everyone who believes shall also perform and even greater works will they do because He was departing earth going to the Father. In other words, Jesus said that the same works He was performing, anyone who believes in Him will continue because He would send the Spirit of God (the Holy Spirit) to perform the very same works on earth. Some people have argued that the greatest of all works is love. I agree wholeheartedly. Some people say this as a cop-out against having to believe in the power of God to heal, cast out devils, and raise the dead. However, if we can't believe for the smaller works of healing and casting out devils, how will we believe God for the greater works of authentic godly love? I have seen the power of God in forgiveness, in loving my enemies, in overcoming evil with good and praying for those who persecute me and speak all sorts of evil against me. The power of God to love is real. I exhort us to continue doing ALL the works Jesus told us to perform by faith. He said, "those who believe" would do these things. Let us only believe so as to move on to the "greater things".
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