GREAT THINGS ENTERPRISE
CLAUDE BLACK
Mark 4:10
Down Time
For several years I worked under the supervision of Jess Waugh, a skilled craftsman. Jess was a patient and thoughtful man who carefully approached each task. He could take a set of blueprints and bring its picture to reality. I never saw Jess face a task that he could not master. On one occasion, I saw him sharpen and temper a chisel. Tempering metal is a process of heat treatment meant to improve the toughness of alloys such as steel. A chisel’s tip should be “tough,” not hard. If it’s hard, it will chip and become dull. I asked him to show me the tempering process, but at that time, we were in the middle of a task, so Jess said that when he had time, he’d teach me how to do it. True to his word, when there was a break, he demonstrated the tempering process, explaining each step. He then gave me a dull chisel, which I had to sharpen and temper under his watchful supervision.
St. Mark described a time in Jesus’ life when he was teaching a large crowd. The crowd pressed around him, so he got into a boat, which he used as a platform from which he continued his lesson. On one occasion, he told the crowd about a farmer who went about sowing seed. “And when he was alone, those around him, with the twelve, asked him about the parables.” (Mark 4:10) Some writers suggest the possibility that Jesus saw a farmer in the distance and used that scene as the setting for his lesson. Later, when there was not the press of a crowd, those close to Jesus—“those around him, with the twelve”—asked him to explain the meaning of his story, thinking that there must be more to his lesson than a description of a man planting seed. They asked Jesus about this when they were alone, when there was a break in the action, when they could consider the lesson more thoroughly.
Teachers, such as Jesus on the occasion described by Mark, and Jess when there was a break in the schedule, know how important it is that a student grasp the meaning of the lesson being taught.
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