When Jesus Walked on Water and Other Impossible Things
What’s Mark 6 about?
This chapter captures Jesus at the height of his ministry – sending out the Twelve, feeding thousands with a few loaves and fish, and walking on water like it’s the most natural thing in the world. It’s a collision of the miraculous and the mundane that leaves everyone, including his disciples, scratching their heads about who this carpenter from Nazareth really is.
The Full Context
Mark 6 sits right in the middle of Mark’s Gospel, where the pace picks up dramatically. Mark has been building his case that Jesus is the Messiah through a series of escalating miracles and confrontations. But now we hit a pivotal moment – Jesus returns to his hometown of Nazareth only to face rejection, then immediately pivots to training his disciples for ministry. The chapter was written around 65-70 AD, likely in Rome, for a primarily Gentile audience who needed to understand that following Jesus meant embracing the impossible.
The literary structure here is brilliant. Mark sandwiches the story of John the Baptist’s death between Jesus sending out the Twelve and their return, creating dramatic tension about what it costs to follow God’s calling. Then he follows this with two of his most spectacular miracles – the feeding of the 5000 and walking on water. Mark is methodically building toward that crucial question in Mark 8:29: “But who do you say that I am?” Every story in this chapter pushes readers toward that ultimate question about Jesus’s identity.
What the Ancient Words Tell Us
The Greek verb Mark uses when Jesus “splagchnizomai” (was moved with compassion) for the crowd in Mark 6:34 literally refers to your guts churning. It’s visceral, physical – not some ethereal divine pity, but the kind of deep, gut-wrenching compassion you feel when you see real human need. This wasn’t Jesus thinking, “Oh, these people need help.” This was Jesus feeling their desperation in his bones.
Grammar Geeks
When Jesus tells the disciples to “didomi” (give) them something to eat in Mark 6:37, he uses the same word that appears in the Lord’s Prayer for “give us this day our daily bread.” Mark is connecting Jesus’s provision of physical bread to God’s ongoing provision for all human needs – it’s not just about lunch.
The word Mark uses for Jesus walking “epi” the sea in Mark 6:48 is the same preposition used in Job 9:8 where it says God “treads on the waves of the sea.” For any Jewish reader familiar with Hebrew Scripture, this would have been a thunderbolt moment – Mark is claiming Jesus is doing something only YHWH does.
What Would the Original Audience Have Heard?
When Jesus fed the 5000, Mark’s first readers would have immediately thought of Moses and the manna in the wilderness. But there’s a crucial difference – Moses asked God to provide bread from heaven. Jesus is the provider. He doesn’t pray for a miracle; he performs one. For Mark’s audience, this was a not-so-subtle claim about Jesus’s divine identity.
The detail about the “green grass” in Mark 6:39 wasn’t just scenic description. In the Holy Land, grass is only green during the brief rainy season around Passover. Mark is telling us this miracle happened during Passover – the feast celebrating God’s liberation of Israel from Egypt. Jesus is positioning himself as the new Moses, leading a new exodus.
Did You Know?
The phrase “companies upon companies” (literally “symposiums upon symposiums”) in Mark 6:39 uses Greek vocabulary typically associated with Greek dinner parties. Mark is painting a picture of Jesus hosting the ultimate banquet – not just feeding people, but welcoming them to his table with dignity and celebration.
But Wait… Why Did They Not Understand?
Here’s where Mark drops one of his most puzzling statements: “They did not understand about the loaves, for their hearts were hardened” (Mark 6:52). Wait – they literally just saw Jesus walk on water, and Mark says they didn’t get it because of the bread miracle?
This seems backward until you realize what Mark is doing. Walking on water is spectacular, but it could be dismissed as a one-time supernatural event. The feeding miracle, however, reveals something much more profound about Jesus’s identity – he provides sustenance, he cares for human need, he acts with the authority of the God who fed Israel in the wilderness. The walking on water confirms what the bread already revealed: this is God among us.
Wait, That’s Strange…
Why does Jesus initially intend to “pass by” the struggling disciples in Mark 6:48? The Greek verb “parerchomai” is the same word used when God “passed by” Moses in Exodus 33:19. This isn’t Jesus being inconsiderate – it’s a theophany, a divine appearance designed to reveal God’s glory.
How This Changes Everything
The progression in Mark 6 is breathtaking. It starts with Jesus being rejected in his hometown because people can’t see past his ordinary background (Mark 6:3). But by the end of the chapter, he’s walking on water and calming storms with a word. Mark is showing us that God often chooses to work through the ordinary, the familiar, the overlooked.
This chapter also reveals something crucial about how God’s kingdom advances – through multiplication, not addition. Jesus doesn’t create new disciples; he multiplies the impact of the ones he has. He doesn’t create food from nothing; he multiplies what’s already there. The kingdom grows not through flashy displays of power, but through the faithful stewardship of what seems insufficient.
“Mark is showing us that the biggest obstacle to recognizing Jesus isn’t his humanity – it’s our inability to believe that God could work through someone so ordinary, so familiar, so much like us.”
The disciples’ hardened hearts in Mark 6:52 serve as a warning. You can witness miracles and still miss the point. You can see Jesus perform the impossible and still not understand who he really is. Understanding Jesus requires more than observing his power – it requires recognizing his heart.
Key Takeaway
Mark 6 teaches us that Jesus’s power flows from his compassion, not the other way around. When we’re moved by genuine concern for others’ needs – physical, spiritual, emotional – we position ourselves to participate in God’s miraculous provision. The question isn’t whether God can do the impossible, but whether we’ll trust him with our five loaves and two fish.
Further Reading
Internal Links:
- Mark 6:34 – Jesus’s compassion for the crowd
- Mark 6:50 – “Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid”
- Mark 6:52 – The disciples’ hardened hearts
External Scholarly Resources:
