Powers of the Age to Come, Now: Daily Thoughts from Mark (Mark 6:53-56)

Jesus taught us to pray for the kingdom’s coming, to pray for God’s will to be done on earth as it is in heaven.  But Jesus also taught that with his coming the kingdom of God was at hand.  It was certainly present in the person of Jesus more than it ever had been and yet his crucifixion, the rejection of his kingship, has meant the delay of the kingdom’s coming.

Should we expect kingdom blessings in the absence of the King?

When they had crossed over, they came to land at Gennesaret and moored to the shore. And when they got out of the boat, the people immediately recognized him and ran about the whole region and began to bring the sick people on their beds to wherever they heard he was. And wherever he came, in villages, cities, or countryside, they laid the sick in the marketplaces and implored him that they might touch even the fringe of his garment. And as many as touched it were made well. (Mark 6:53-56, ESV)

Though they intended to reach Bethsaida the wind has driven them to Gennesaret which, even though a more remote location, the populous knows Jesus’ reputation well enough to know that this is an opportunity for their sick to be healed.  Word spreads rapidly and any town, village or even countryside area he comes to he is greeted by people begging him to heal them.  Once again they look to the fringe of his garment, a representation of Jesus’ holiness and something the Pharisees made overly long to impress people (Matthew 23:5), and whoever touches it is healed, no exceptions.

This is God’s way of verifying that Jesus is sent from Him and that a new day has dawned.  The kingdom is a place where sickness is not known and where love abounds under the rule of the heavenly King, and so Jesus gives many tastes of the kingdom to those to whom he preaches.  Though the frequency of miracles today is much diminished we are still being shown, in advance of the kingdom,  its coming power in this same manner as we come to Jesus in faith.  We are tasting the “powers of the age to come,” as the author of Hebrews puts it (Hebrews 6:5).

Every answer to prayer, every demonstration of healing, and any power expression is a brief glimpse of the kingdom.  The kingdom is not yet, but it is coming.  We are subjects of this kingdom and so have access to its powers through Jesus.  When we hold a demon to account we are exercising the power of the King.  Of course, in that day, when the kingdom does finally arrive, there will be an abundance of healing.  In fact, in the eternal kingdom death will be banished.  In the millennial kingdom (Revelation 20) that precedes it there seems to be death at a very old age as the norm (Isaiah 65:20).  But the rule of Christ in each phase of the kingdom will mean glory beyond compare.