Devotions: Mark - A Few Resources

Updated: January 9, 2022 - Fixed formatting, links, images, and order of preference. -Ed.

Here just the very small list of resources on Mark that I have found most helpful.

It Goes Without Say

Christian Standard Bible
Holmon Publishing. 2020.
Goodreads

Many times, many teachers, preachers, and small group leaders (myself included) will “cut straight to the chase” and engage the commentary instead of engaging the Word of God. Remember, the commentaries are not without error—they are the observations of the author.

Slow down, pray, read, chew and meditate.

Note: I use the Christian Standard Bible version on this blog by default. Other translations, such as the ESV or the NIV1984, will be noted as such.

ESV Study Bible
Crossway. 2016.
Goodreads

Incredible resource.

I have purchased this resource multiple times over for myself and friends. If you want one and can’t afford one, hit me up.

If I had to pick just one resource (hardcover vs. leather vs. paperback vs. digital), I use it way more in my Olive Tree Study Bible than anything else.

Commentaries

Calvin’s Commentaries.
by John Calvin.
Baker. 2009.
Olive Tree

I mention this because in my go-to mobile Bible Study App, Olive Tree, Calvin’s Commentaries are my go-to Commentary text of choice when I need clarification on the go. You can get the entire digital set for your phone (and computer) for about $40 $19.99 from Olive Tree!

Mark: An Expositional Commentary
by R.C. Sproul.
Reformation Trust Publisher. 2011.
Goodreads

If you had to get just one commentary series to collect, get this one. There are just seven in the series with Luke was just released.

Easily read cover-to-cover.

Note: I noticed that the latest editions from Sproul’s set since the Luke release are no longer part of the St. Andrew’s Expositional Set that started with Mark, John, Romans, Matthew, 1 & 2 Peter, and Acts. I don’t know why they drop the set name but since the passing of Dr. Sproul, it kind of makes sense. These commentaries are really a collection of Sproul’s sermons put into book form, which is way easier said than done. Sermons are meant to be primarily preached audibly. To get them to be read in a book form takes an editor worth their chops along with the preacher to make sure everything is super clear in written form. -Ed.

New Testament Commentary: Exposition of the Gospel According to Mark
by William Hendriksen.
Baker. 1981.
Goodreads

Sheer luck (aka sheer blessing from God) that I ran into a small incomplete set of Hendriksen’s Commentaries at my local Half Priced Books. I have never heard of this guy and the only facts I could find out about him was from [Wikipedia](william hendriksen commentary online).

From the article:

In his influential work Israel and Prophecy, written a year after the 1967 war, and still in print, Hendriksen criticized the view, held by dispensationalists and Christian Zionists, that the Bible prophesies the return and restoration of the Jews to the land of Israel.¹ Dispensationalist pastor Barry Horner describes Hendriksen’s work as “a classic representation of replacement theology”.²

Make no bones about it: it grieves me to the core that Dispensationalism is the auto-default eschatology of too many American Evangelical churches–including every single church I have ever attended in my life with the exception of the church I attend now. It saddens and frustrates me that I was born into a church that automatically taught a doctrine that was born within the 20th century. But, as with anything, theology and doctrine are to be taught and never assumed.

That said, that one little blurb in Wikipedia and knowing there was one (1) pastor who bucked against Rapture theology, William Hendriksen forever became ‘my boy’.

The Gospel according to Mark: The English Text With Introduction, Exposition, and Notes (The New International Commentary on the New Testament)
by William L. Lane.
Eerdman’s. 1974.
Goodreads

Incredible thorough and wonderfully written, Dr. Lane walks the reader masterfully through not only the Gospel but the perspective of the writer, John-Mark.

Mark (Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, NT Volume 2)
Edited by Thomas C. Odin & Christopher A. Hall
IVP Academic. 2005.
Goodreads

I think this entire series is an excellent resource to have on hand if you can pony up the scratch. It’s all fine and good to read guys from within the last few centuries. But how about reading commentary from within the first few centuries after the ascension of Christ. You ain’t going to read anything shockingly new. But what you are going realize there is absolutely new under the sun and Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

Mark (The Story of God Bible Commentary Series)
by Timothy G. Gombis.
Zondervan Academic. March 9th 2021.
Goodreads