Follow the Thread

Discover how following the threads between Scripture’s stories reveals the bigger message Jesus is teaching about Himself, His Kingdom, and how to see.

I have loved walking through the book of Mark with Jesus.

I say with Jesus intentionally because somewhere along the way, the way I was reading Scripture began to change.

I wasn’t simply reading to find out what happened next or looking for a verse I could apply to my life that morning. I started getting curious.

Why did Jesus say that?

Why did Mark tell us that detail?

Why does this story come immediately after that one?

Hasn’t Jesus been talking about this already?

And slowly, I began noticing threads.

Stories I had always read as individual accounts began flowing into one another. Things Jesus said several chapters earlier suddenly appeared again in another form. A parable became an action. A question became an encounter. Something the disciples couldn’t understand became a living illustration a few stories later.

The stories weren’t random.

They were preaching a message.

And I began learning to follow the thread.

Jesus Was Teaching Them How to See

I started thinking about how I teach my own children.

When there is something important I want them to understand, I don’t necessarily sit them down, give them one lesson, and consider the subject finished.

Once the conversation has begun, I notice the lesson everywhere.

Something happens while we’re out and I say, See that? That’s what we were talking about.

A situation comes up between siblings and we return to it.

We watch a movie and suddenly there it is again.

I’m raising their awareness.

Eventually, I hope they won’t need me to point it out anymore.

They will have learned how to see it themselves.

The more I’ve walked through Mark, the more I’ve wondered if this is what I’m watching Jesus do with His disciples.

He isn’t simply giving them information about the Kingdom.

He’s teaching them how to see it.

And they don’t see very well at first.

Neither did I.

Having Eyes, Do You Not See?

Seeing is actually a recurring theme throughout Mark.

At one point Jesus asks His disciples:

“Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear?”

—Mark 8:18

They have been with Him.

They have watched the miracles.

They have heard the teaching.

They have seen Him feed thousands with almost nothing.

And yet they still don’t understand what He is showing them.

Their problem isn’t a lack of information.

It’s perception.

They are looking at the Kingdom through the categories they already understand.

Greatness.

Power.

Success.

Position.

Wealth.

Importance.

Enough.

Not enough.

And Jesus keeps turning those categories upside down.

They argue about who is greatest.

Jesus puts a child among them.

They think greatness means position.

Jesus talks about serving.

James and John ask for places of honor.

Jesus tells them that whoever wants to become great must become a servant.

Again and again, Jesus isn’t merely telling them what to think.

He’s retraining the way they see.

The Rich Man and the Blind Man

I noticed this recently in a progression I had never seen before.

A rich young ruler comes to Jesus asking what he must do to inherit eternal life.

He has so much.

Wealth.

Accomplishment.

A record of obedience.

When Jesus mentions the commandments, the man essentially responds, I’ve done all of that.

His attention is on what he brings.

And yet when Jesus asks him to release the thing he trusts, he walks away grieving.

A few stories later, Jesus encounters Bartimaeus.

Bartimaeus is almost his opposite.

He has nothing.

He’s blind.

He’s sitting beside the road begging.

He has no impressive record to present and nothing with which to establish himself before Jesus.

He simply cries:

“Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”

And suddenly I saw the contrast.

The rich man comes focused on what he has done.

Bartimaeus comes focused on who Jesus is.

And there’s an incredible irony in the story.

The blind man sees.

Everyone around Bartimaeus can physically see Jesus, but Bartimaeus recognizes Him.

He knows his own need, but he isn’t consumed with his lack.

His need points him toward Someone.

His poverty doesn’t produce scarcity.

It produces dependence.

And his revelation of Jesus makes him audacious enough to cry even louder when everyone tells him to be quiet.

Jesus has been teaching His disciples how to see.

And now a blind man becomes the illustration of sight.

Then Jesus Sits Across from the Treasury

Keep following the thread.

A little later, Jesus warns His disciples about the scribes.

They walk around in long robes.

They enjoy public recognition.

They take the best seats.

They make impressive prayers.

And Jesus says they “devour widows’ houses.”

Then Mark tells us:

“And he sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box.”

—Mark 12:41

Jesus watches.

Many wealthy people put in large amounts.

Then a poor widow approaches and drops in two tiny coins.

It would have been easy not to notice her at all.

But Jesus calls His disciples over.

It’s almost as though He says:

Look.

Do you see her?

Then He tells them that she has given more than everyone else.

They gave out of their abundance.

She gave out of her poverty.

There were those words again.

Abundance.

Poverty.

And suddenly I found myself thinking about the rich young ruler and Bartimaeus.

The rich young ruler had much, but couldn’t release it.

Bartimaeus had little and came completely dependent upon Jesus.

Now wealthy people are giving impressive amounts from their abundance, while a widow with almost nothing puts everything she has into the treasury.

I don’t think Jesus is teaching that poverty itself is more spiritual.

He’s revealing a posture.

The Kingdom is not entered through our sufficiency.

The rich young ruler looked at what he possessed.

Bartimaeus looked at who Jesus was.

And now, at the treasury, Jesus once again teaches His disciples that heaven doesn’t measure things the way they do.

They see amounts.

Jesus sees differently.

They see impressive gifts.

Jesus notices the widow.

Once again:

Look again.

Sometimes Jesus Finishes the Sentence Three Stories Later

This has completely changed the way I read Scripture.

For years, I often approached the Bible passage by passage.

Read the story.

Find the lesson.

Apply it to my life.

Move on.

And there is certainly value in slowing down and studying an individual passage.

But we can miss something beautiful when we pull every story apart from the conversation surrounding it.

The widow can become:

Christians should give sacrificially.

The rich young ruler can become:

Don’t love money.

Bartimaeus can become:

Have enough faith and keep crying out.

But what happens when we put them back into the story Mark is telling?

Something larger begins to emerge.

Jesus has been dismantling the disciples’ understanding of greatness, power, wealth, righteousness, importance, and the Kingdom.

He’s teaching them how to see.

And suddenly these aren’t three random lessons.

They’re part of one conversation.

Context doesn’t merely protect us from interpreting a verse incorrectly.

Context helps us hear the conversation.

Get Curious

I think this is why curiosity has become such an important part of reading Scripture for me.

I’m not approaching the Bible simply asking:

What am I supposed to do?

I’m learning to ask:

What is Jesus revealing?

What has He already been teaching?

Why does this story come next?

Have I seen this word or idea before?

Is there a contrast here?

What are the disciples noticing?

What are they still failing to see?

What is Jesus showing them about Himself?

What is He showing them about His Kingdom?

And then I keep reading.

Because sometimes the answer isn’t contained within the verses directly in front of me.

Sometimes Jesus introduces something and then lets me watch it play out.

A parable becomes an encounter.

A teaching becomes a person.

A question becomes an illustration.

The thread keeps going.

Let Scripture Interpret Scripture

I saw another example of this while reading Mark 13.

The chapter begins with one of the disciples looking at the temple and saying to Jesus:

“Teacher, see what manner of stones and what buildings are here!”

And I stopped.

Why is this here?

It seemed almost random.

I have usually heard Mark 13 discussed as an end-times passage, so I wanted to move right past the stones and start trying to understand the tribulation, the signs, the angels, the gathering of the elect, and the Son of Man coming in the clouds.

But following the thread has been teaching me not to rush past the details that don’t seem to fit.

So I stayed with the stones.

The disciple is looking at this magnificent temple—something enormous, impressive, seemingly permanent—and essentially saying:

Jesus, look at this.

And Jesus tells him that not one of those stones will be left upon another.

Suddenly I wondered if this wasn’t a random introduction to the chapter at all.

What if it is part of the message?

Throughout Mark, the disciples have been learning how to see. Again and again, Jesus has challenged what looks impressive, important, abundant, powerful, or permanent from a human perspective.

The rich young ruler looked like he had everything. Bartimaeus looked like he had nothing.

The fig tree was covered in leaves and looked fruitful. It wasn’t.

The temple looked magnificent, yet Jesus had just exposed what was happening within it.

And now a disciple looks at the temple and says, in essence:

Look at these magnificent stones.

And Jesus tells him:

They are coming down.

Don’t confuse what looks impressive with what is permanent.

That changed how I approached the rest of the chapter.

Before trying to define every sign Jesus describes, I could first ask:

What conversation are we already in?

Jesus is preparing four disciples for a world in which many of the structures they assumed were permanent would be shaken.

The temple would fall.

They would face persecution.

Nations and kingdoms would rise against one another.

Even the powers in the heavens would be shaken.

And yet, near the end of the chapter, Jesus says:

“Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.”

There is the contrast again.

The disciple begins:

Look at these stones.

Jesus ends:

My words will not pass away.

Maybe the point isn’t simply to give them information about everything that will happen.

Maybe Jesus is teaching them where to anchor themselves when everything they thought was permanent begins to shake.

And that kept me from immediately trying to turn Mark 13 into a formula or timeline.

It made me curious about the continuous message.

Then I reached another phrase that made me stop.

Jesus says they will see “the Son of Man coming in the clouds with great power and glory.”

I had heard before that clouds could represent people in Scripture, like the “great cloud of witnesses” in Hebrews, and I immediately began interpreting the passage through that definition.

Clouds equal people.

But Troy reminded me of something he used to teach when we were pastors:

Let Scripture interpret Scripture.

Instead of asking, What does a cloud symbolize? I could get curious and ask:

Where have I seen this cloud before?

And there was another thread.

God led Israel through the wilderness in a cloud.

He descended upon Sinai in a cloud.

His glory filled the tabernacle and the temple in a cloud.

Daniel saw “One like the Son of Man, coming with the clouds of heaven,” approaching the Ancient of Days and receiving an everlasting kingdom.

At Jesus’ transfiguration, a cloud overshadowed them and the Father spoke from it.

Then in Mark 13, Jesus tells His disciples they will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds with great power and glory.

And one chapter later, standing before the high priest, Jesus reaches back to that imagery again:

“You will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.”

Understanding this imagery in context reveals why the high priest reacted as he did: “he tore his clothes.”

Not because he was afraid Jesus was coming with a crowd, but because Jesus was revealing who He was.

The cloud wasn’t a code I needed to crack.

It was a thread I needed to follow.

And following that thread didn’t merely give me a better definition of cloud.

It revealed something about Jesus.

I think this is an important distinction.

A formula tells me what something must mean.
A thread invites me to discover what Scripture is showing me.

If I decide that clouds equal people, I can carry that formula from passage to passage and unknowingly impose my definition upon the text.

But curiosity allows me to ask:

Where have I seen this before?

What conversation are we already in?

Is Jesus echoing something His disciples would have recognized?

What happens if I follow this image backward through Scripture?

Why did the writer include this detail?

And suddenly the Bible begins talking to itself.

Scripture interprets Scripture.

The Old Testament illuminates the New.

One Gospel passage illuminates another.

And sometimes the detail that initially seems completely out of place becomes the very thing that helps me see what I would have missed.

Why is this here?

I’m beginning to think that may be one of the most valuable questions I can bring with me when I read the Bible.

Not because every unusual detail contains some hidden code.

But because curiosity keeps me from rushing past something simply because it doesn’t fit the interpretation I brought with me.

I don’t have to make the Bible mean something new.

I can become curious enough to discover the conversation that has been there all along.

Revelation Before Application

This has also freed me from needing to immediately turn everything I read into something I need to do.

Instead of beginning with:

What does this mean for me?

I can begin with:

What is Jesus showing me about Himself?

That’s a very different posture.

I can behold before I apply.

I can discover before I define.

I can follow before I formulate.

And strangely, I think the application becomes richer because of it.

I’m no longer extracting a principle from Jesus.

I’m getting to know Him.

I’m learning how He thinks.

What He notices.

What He values.

What He calls abundance.

What He calls greatness.

Who He stops for.

Who He points toward.

What everyone else walks past that catches His attention.

I’m learning to see through His eyes.

And perhaps that’s what discipleship has always been about.

Follow the Thread

I have loved walking through Mark with Jesus because it has felt less like studying a textbook and more like following Someone down a road.

I don’t know what He is going to show me around the next corner.

But I have learned to pay attention.

When something seems strange, I stop.

When a detail feels unnecessary, I get curious.

When a story reminds me of something I read three chapters ago, I go back.

When Jesus asks a question, I don’t rush past it.

And when something doesn’t make sense yet, I keep walking.

Because the stories aren’t random.

Jesus is revealing Himself.

He’s revealing His Kingdom.

He’s teaching His disciples—and us—how to see.

So don’t be too quick to pull out the lesson and move on.

Stay in the story.

Look backward.

Look forward.

Notice what repeats.

Ask good questions.

And follow the thread.

Because sometimes Jesus doesn’t finish His sentence at the end of the paragraph.

Sometimes He finishes it three stories later.

In everything you do -eat, play, and love- may it always be seasoned with Joy!