Mark 6:7 - Meaning and Application

Here is the commission given to the twelve apostles, to preach and work miracles. It is the same one we saw more fully in Matthew 10. Mark does not name them here, as Matthew does, because he had already named them when they were first called to follow Christ (Mark 3:16-19). So far, they had been with Christ, sat at his feet, heard his teaching, and seen his miracles. Now he begins to use them in his work, because they had received so they could give, and learned so they could teach. They must not keep studying forever, as if in a school only to gather knowledge, but must go out and use what they had learned for the good of others.

Christ sent them out two by two, and Mark mentions that detail. They went in pairs so that the testimony of two witnesses would be firm, and so they could be company for each other among strangers. They could strengthen one another, encourage one another, help if anything went wrong, and keep each other steady. A common soldier has a partner, and it is a good rule that two are better than one. In this way, Christ taught his ministers to work together and to give and receive help.

He gave them power over unclean spirits, meaning evil spirits. He sent them against the devil’s kingdom and gave them authority to cast demons out of people’s bodies as a sign of how their message would break the devil’s hold on human souls. Dr. Lightfoot suggests that they healed sickness and cast out demons by the Spirit, but preached only what they had learned from Christ’s own mouth. In that way, their miracles confirmed their message.

He also told them not to take food or money with them, so they would appear everywhere as poor men, not attached to this world. That would give them greater freedom to call others away from earthly things and toward the world to come. When Christ later told them to take a purse and bag (Luke 22:36), that did not mean he cared less for them. It meant they would face harder times and less welcome than they had at first.

Matthew and Luke forbid them to take a staff for fighting, while Mark allows a staff for walking. So they were to travel in the plainest and simplest way possible. They were not to wear shoes, but only sandals, and they were not to carry two coats. Their stay would be short, they were to return before winter, and those they preached to would gladly supply what they lacked.

He told them that when they came to a city, they should stay in the first house that received them and make it their base until they left that place (Mark 6:10). Since they came with a message that ought to make them welcome, they should give their first hosts the credit of good faith and not think they were being a burden. If one house would not receive them, another would.

Christ also gave a serious warning about those who rejected the gospel they preached (Mark 6:11). Whoever would not receive them, or even hear them, was to be left behind. They were to shake the dust off their feet as a witness against such people. That dust would show that a fair offer of life and happiness had been made to them, but they had refused it. Their doom, therefore, would be their own. That dust, like the dust of Egypt (Exodus 9:9), would stand as a sign of judgment. In the day of final judgment, their condemnation will be more severe than Sodom’s, because the apostles came with the offers of gospel grace, and to despise them is a dreadful sin.

The apostles then acted on their commission. Though they knew their own weakness and expected no worldly gain from this work, they obeyed their Master and depended on his strength. They went out like Abraham, not knowing where they were going.

The message they preached was repentance (Mark 6:12). They told people to change their minds and turn from sin, because the kingdom of the Messiah was near. This shows the great aim of gospel preaching, which is to bring people to repentance, a new heart, and a new way of life. They did not waste time on clever theories. They called people to turn from sin and turn to God.

They also worked miracles. The power Christ gave them over evil spirits was real, and they used it. They cast out many demons, and they anointed many sick people with oil and healed them (Mark 6:13). Some think the oil was used as medicine, following Jewish custom. But it is more likely that it was a sign of miraculous healing, used by Christ’s command, though not recorded here. It was later used by the elders of the church, to whom the Spirit gave the gift of healing (James 5:14). Since anointing with oil belonged to that special power, and that power has long since ended, the sign also ended with it.