Yesterday we looked at Mark 15:31: "He saved others; He cannot save Himself."
The mockers continued in Mark 15:32: "Let this Christ, the King of Israel, now come down from the cross, so that we may see and believe!"
What had these people already seen? "The blind receive sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have the gospel preached to them. Blessed is he who does not take offense at Me" (Luke 7:22-23). You would think these people had enough miraculous proof of Jesus' lordship. They saw all these things and yet did not believe.
Sometimes we might think, "If I could only SEE a miracle, if I could only watch Jesus raise someone from the dead - THEN I'd really believe." It all comes down to our hearts. Many hearts are like those at the cross. They had even seen the Lord's handiwork and still mocked, cursed, and crucified Him. As He hung there, they continued to call for signs. Jesus refused to perform signs for people who demanded it. He knew their hearts were not prepared to accept Him, no matter what He did! And many today are not prepared to accept Christ, no matter what they see or are told about Him. Though Christ would have come down from the cross before their very eyes, they still would not have believed in Him!
Faith does not come through seeing today, but through HEARING the word of God. Faith came the same way in the first century. Remember what Jesus said to Thomas in John 20:29: "Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed."
Nathan