GREAT THINGS ENTERPRISE
CLAUDE BLACK
Mark 6:46
Locaton, Location, Location
Articles about real estate sales often emphasize location. It is often emphasized with the refrain, “Location, location, location.” Prudent business investors do careful studies about traffic patterns, foot traffic, local businesses, and housing developments before investing in a new building. In Northeast Georgia, one of a new class of discount variety retailers opened in a location roughly equidistant from two cities about fifteen miles apart. There are no housing developments around the store, which sits back off the major highway and is only accessible via a secondary road. Either the developer knows something the general public doesn’t, or he failed to consider “location, location, location.”
After Jesus taught, ministered to, and miraculously fed a huge crowd, there was a buzz among the people about making him king. Picking up on the sentiment, Jesus sent his disciples on ahead of him across the lake. “And after he bade them farewell, he went away to the mountain to pray.” (Mark 6:46) Writing about the same event, Matthew and John said that he went to the mountain by himself to pray. (Matt. 14:23; John 6:15) As in this instance, the writers often point out the locations in which Jesus prayed—in the wilderness, on the sea, on a hillside, in synagogues, in the garden, at meals, in a house, and on the cross.
Mountain experiences throughout the Bible stand out—Abraham and Isaac on Mount Moriah, Moses and the burning bush on Mount Horeb, Moses receiving the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai, Elijah hearing the still small voice on Mount Horeb, Jesus preaching the Sermon on the Mount, the disciples receiving the Great Commission on a mountain in Galilee, and Jesus’ ascension from the Mount of Olives.
This particular mountain in Mark’s account has no name, except that it was in the region of eastern Bethsaida. Undoubtedly weary after a voyage across the lake, a long day of teaching and ministering, and a miraculous meal, he had just avoided a dangerous populist attempt to make him a king. There were many things to pray about. He needed a place alone where he could talk to the Father; he chose a mountain.
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