Mark 4:11

Plain English Version

Jesus said, “You mob follow me, so God wants you to know what my stories are all about, so I will tell you what they mean. Those stories are about how God gets people into his family. But other people don’t follow me, so they only get the picture stories. I will not tell them what they mean.

Cross References

Matthew 11:25

At that time, Jesus prayed to God. He said, “Father, you are the biggest boss. You are the boss over everything in the sky and everything on the earth. There are some people here that reckon they are smart, and they reckon they understand everything. And there are other people that are just like little kids. They know that they are not smart. Thank you for showing what your message means to those people that are like kids. And thank you for not showing it to those people that reckon they are smart.

Mark 3:23

Jesus knew the law teachers were rubbishing him like that, so he called out to them and said, “Come here and listen to me.” Then he told them stories to teach them. He said, “Think about Satan, the boss over the bad spirits. Do you reckon he fights against his own mob of bad spirits? That doesn’t make sense.

Mark 4:10

Some time later, Jesus came away from that big mob of people. Then just his 12 special workers and a few other people sat around him. They said to him, “You tell us picture stories, but we can’t understand them. What are your stories all about?”

Mark 4:2

He told them picture stories to teach them lots of things. Jesus told them this story. He said,

1 Corinthians 4:7

You yourselves are no better than other people. God gave you everything that you have. So you can’t reckon that you are really smart, and that you got it for yourselves.

Ephesians 1:9

God planned it all a long time ago, and nobody knew about it. But now he let us know about it. He told us that he is using Jesus to do the things he planned, things that make him happy.

Colossians 4:5

And you too, whenever you are with people that don’t believe in Jesus, if you can tell them about him, you have to do it. Be sensible in how you live with those people.

1 Thessalonians 4:12

Then you will not have to ask other people for things. If you live like that, the people that don’t know God will see that you are good, and they will respect you.

1 Timothy 3:7

He has to be a man that everybody says is a good man. Even people that are not Christians have to say that he is good. If they know that he is a good man, they will respect him. The devil always tries to make Christian leaders go wrong so that he can shame them. It is like the devil has a trap and tries to catch them in it, but he can’t catch a man that is always good.