THE SHOW-AND-TELL METHOD
7 Calling the Twelve to him, he began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over impure spirits.
8 These were his instructions: “Take nothing for the journey except a staff—no bread, no bag, no money in your belts. 9 Wear sandals but not an extra shirt. 10 Whenever you enter a house, stay there until you leave that town. 11 And if any place will not welcome you or listen to you, leave that place and shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.”
12 They went out and preached that people should repent. 13 They drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them. Mark 6:7-13
This is such a challenging passage of Scripture. How is it that the church has moved so far from Jesus’ original mandate? He may no longer be with us in the flesh but the same Spirit that energised Him is in His church. The same simple plan works today as it did then.
I suppose that the greater the number of people who become participators in the life of the kingdom, the greater the variety of opinions, interpretations and understanding of the words of Jesus and the greater the possibility of corrupting the simplicity of His message and method.
On the other side of the coin, I marvel at the confidence Jesus had in these twelve men. He had not spent very long with them, perhaps a year or so, but He sent them out with instructions to focus on the most important part of their task, to introduce people to the kingdom of God by the show-and-tell method. They were to show people God’s love and power by healing, casting out demons and undoing the work of the devil, and to tell them about the kingdom of God where perfection reigned. He trusted them to do it with the same clarity and simplicity that He worked in.
How do I measure up? Like them, most of my learning is unlearning and relearning the truth through the renewal of my mind.