James Nisbet Commentary - Mark 5:36 - 5:36

Online Resource Library

Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | Download

James Nisbet Commentary - Mark 5:36 - 5:36


(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)

This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

FAITH AND LIFE

‘Be not afraid, only believe.’

Mar_5:36

Our Blessed Lord had just performed three out of that wondrous cycle of miracles which Mark brings into close sequence. First, the ‘stilling of the tempest’; second, the casting out of the fiends which possessed the demoniac of Gadara; third, the healing of the woman with an issue of blood; fourth, the raising of Jairus’s little daughter. The first demonstrated His control over the elements; the second, His absolute authority over evil spirits; the third, His power over human suffering and incurable disease; the fourth, His supreme sovereignty over the ‘King of Terrors’—Death itself.

I. The faith of Jairus.—Jairus’s faith has been compared with that of other suppliants for our Lord’s help, and has not always received the full measure of admiration that it deserves. There are points in the incident which show that his faith was very sorely tried, and that it stood the test, and stood it well. Our Lord, it is to be noticed, complied at once with the father’s request, but His progress is (we cannot help feeling it to be so ourselves, as we read) neither direct nor quick enough to satisfy the natural impatience of that poor father’s heart. He stops on His way to perform another act of mercy; but the delay does not extort a single word of expostulation, not even a sigh, from the distracted man. Assuredly Jairus had faith, and strong faith, too. For this delay, what might it not involve? Indeed, what did it not involve? The poor sufferer who arrested our Lord’s attention is cured, and again a forward movement is about to be made, when the father’s worst fears are realised. ‘While He yet spake, there came … certain which said, Thy daughter is dead.’ And what does the stricken father do? Does he turn away at once in hopeless despair, or is he hesitating to prefer a yet stranger request before our Lord, hesitating, as the messengers, representing an unbelieving world, exclaim: ‘Why troublest thou the Master any further? ‘However this may have been, our Lord promptly rallied the broken-hearted father with words of encouragement and hope—‘Be not afraid, only believe.’

II. And its reward.—You know the sequel. The Saviour entered the chamber of death with the father and mother of the child and three of His disciples; He entered that chamber, and, after a brief interval, He returned; but He left behind Him a father and mother shedding tears of joy over a darling child restored to life and health. You especially, who are parents, can enter at once into both the sorrow and the joy that fills this story.

III. A lesson for parents.—But, apart from the admiration it excites in all our hearts for the Saviour’s loving sympathy and amazing power, apart from its parabolic teaching, which, like those two kindred miracles of His, points us so plainly to the general Resurrection in the Last Day, there is at least one obvious and important lesson for us parents. There are worse things than even bodily weakness and death—there are the moral plague spots, the sins and vices of our fallen nature; and these, untouched by Him, may end in spiritual death. Let us see to it that our dear children sleep not such a sleep as that. Put them, so far as you can, under His charge; bring them when infants to His Holy Baptism. Pray without ceasing; for hereafter their child-eyes shall open with joy at His call from the eternal throne—‘Damsel, young man, I say unto thee, arise.’

—
Rev. E. F. Cavalier.

Illustration

‘There are certain dangers to which children are peculiarly exposed. There is the danger to their moral and physical well-being which arises from “over-crowding” and bad sanitation—this, as a rule, can scarcely be said to lie at the parents’ door; they have to live where they earn their bread. At the same time it is a matter of such vital importance to the present and future welfare of the race, that parents must not allow themselves to rest satisfied with such surroundings. Notwithstanding compulsory measures now being taken to insure proper accommodation in the houses of the poor, yet so great is the increase of population that these measures scarcely keep pace with the urgent need and its allied risks. It is a question whether it is generally realised how the discipline and education of the child at school is often neutralised by the bad conditions of its home life. But there is another and greater danger arising, partly from this exposure to physical and moral infection, and partly from a lack of the sense of responsibility for the child’s spiritual health on the part of too many parents. Free education, which has relieved the parent of responsibility for his child’s secular education, may, to a great extent, have undermined the parent’s sense of an even higher duty; but, taking it for granted that the majority try to carry out their parts in their children’s worldly training, is it a fact that all are as keen as they should be about their spiritual up-bringing? Do they take care to rear them “in the nurture and admonition of the Lord”? Do they give them every opportunity, and see that they have it, of being brought under the influence of their parish priest and the care of Christ’s Church? And, further, do they use every means to insure that home example—what the children hear and see at home—may agree with what they are taught to be the Will of their Saviour Christ?’