Monthly Archives: July 2020

THE GOSPEL OF MARK – THE WAY DOWN IS THE WAY UP

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THE WAY DOWN IS THE WAY UP

34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to rlfbe my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35 For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. 36 What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? 37 Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? 38 If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels.” Mark 8:34-38

The disciples desperately needed a paradigm shift to give them the perspective and insight into the kingdom of God that would grasp the true nature of the enemy. Like the Pharisees, they were still too engrossed in their opposition to Roman occupation and their passion to be an independent nation once again to realise that a far more dangerous enemy lurked inside their own hearts, the yetzer harah (the evil  eye…a figure of speech meaning the inborn selfishness that only cares for number one) that was traitor to the rule of God.

Why did what Jesus had to say about suffering and submission to His Lordship cut across their way of thinking? It would take something as gruesome and violent as His own submission to death at the hands of the powers of darkness to transform their understanding. His victory over Satan and the dominion of darkness through the resurrection, and the divine energy of the Holy Spirit soaking and saturating their beings would transform their minds and bring them into ECHAD – unity – with Himself and His way. At this point, His words were just seeds, falling into unproductive soil and lying dormant until the power of the Holy Spirit triggered growth and bore fruit in their lives.

Jesus was calling them back to the place where Adam and Eve were before they chose their way over submission to God’s way. Now Jesus was demanding that they set themselves aside completely and yield their loyalty, love and obedience exclusively to Him. Discipleship demands a complete handover of ownership from self to Jesus. He said that no-one can serve two masters. Any master other than Him automatically cancels out His ownership.

This loyalty and obedience to Him opens the disciple to the same kind of rejection and persecution He received but this is a part of the purifying process that leads to true sonship. Suffering purges the heart from self and fosters humility and trust in the God who is always here – Emmanuel. This is the ECHAD that shows the world that Jesus is who He said He is, the Christ, Son of the living God.

THE GOSPEL OF MARK – NOT ROME BUT RELIGION

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NOT ROME BUT RELIGION

31 He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again. 32 He spoke plainly about this, and Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.

33 But when Jesus turned and looked at his disciples, he rebuked Peter. “Get behind me, Satan!” he said. “You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” Mark 8:31-33

This incident shows us how influential Peter was in this group of disciples. He vocalised and the rest of the disciples tended to follow what he said. At this point in his life, where he was unstable in his thinking and still vulnerable to deception, he was a dangerous man in the group and needed to be tamed and brought to heel by Jesus before He could risk allowing him out into the world with his power to influence and persuade. He was a valuable ally but a dangerous enemy.

Jesus was never afraid to offend people as long as it exposed what was on the inside. Peter must have smarted under Jesus’ rebuke. We can imagine him withdrawing from the group, humiliated and angry. He knew Jesus was right but he resented the exposure in front of the other disciples.

It was necessary for Jesus to correct Peter’s wrong thinking and to douse his influence over the other disciples. He could see that they were wavering and He jumped in to put that fire out before it spread. He had introduced them to the necessity of His suffering and death and nothing must detract from the centrality of that because it was the heart of His victory, not over Rome but over sin and death. Rome still had a part to play in helping to form His church through suffering and, ultimately Rome was not the issue.

The greatest threat to Jesus’ mission was not Rome but religion. It was religion that would crucify Him and His victory over religion would be the final victory over the devil because the devil’s most deceptive disguise is religion. People will kill to protect their religious beliefs because religion influences every part of their lives. The Jewish leaders hated Him because He exposed the emptiness and hypocrisy of their religious system.

Religion is power because it holds people in slavery. Satan wields his power through religion and through religious leaders. It is his favourite disguise to keep people enslaved by fear.

THE GOSPEL OF MARK – NO, LORD! NOT THAT WAY

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NO, LORD! NOT THAT WAY

31 He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again. 32 He spoke plainly about this, and Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.

33 But when Jesus turned and looked at his disciples, he rebuked Peter. “Get behind me, Satan!” he said. “You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” Mark 8:31-33

This whole incident at Caesarea Philippi, Jesus’ question, Peter’s response and what followed is an important part of the disciples’ understanding and experience of Jesus as their Messiah. It was part of refashioning Messiah’s person and role in Israel as a nation and in their lives as individuals. Messianic expectation was very high because of the hated Roman oppression. Further, John the Baptist’s ministry had raised their hopes, topped with this man whose ability to do miracles seemed to have no limit.

At Caesarea Philippi, Jesus actually acknowledged Peter’s conclusion, representing the opinion of all the disciples, as true. Then, in the very next breath He warned them to keep quiet about it. Why? Peter may have been accurate in his confession, but he was way off the mark in his understanding of Jesus’ role as Messiah. His very next response to Jesus betrayed his complete misunderstanding of what the Messiah was all about.

It was imperative that the disciples accurately represent their Messiah to their nation and to the world. Jesus did not want them to go blabbing a lot of nonsense about Him because they attached their notion of what they expected of Him to His identity as Messiah. They had to wait until the revelation was complete – until they were thoroughly instructed and convinced by the Holy Spirit of who He was and why He came.

Following His warning not to disclose His identity yet, He began to fill in the details of His mission – suffering, death and resurrection as the imperative route of victory – over a far more powerful and sinister oppressor than Rome, the power of sin and death. Sadly, His words fell on ears padded with the pre-conceived idea that the Messiah had come to conquer Rome and set up a restored kingdom like that of David’s kingdom. They could not take in His apparently failed mission. Peter vocalised their objection and received a sharp rebuke from Jesus. At that moment Satan was speaking through Peter and Jesus silenced him

THE GOSPEL OF MARK – CAESAREA PHILIPPI

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CAESAREA PHILIPPI

27 Jesus and his disciples went on to the villages around Caesarea Philippi. On the way he asked them, “Who do people say I am?”
28 They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.”
29 “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”
Peter answered, “You are the Messiah.”
30 Jesus warned them not to tell anyone about him. Mark 8:27-30

In order to have a better appreciation of the significance of this event, we need to take in the whole scenario. Why Caesarea Philippi? Why could He not have asked the same question at the lakeside or in Judea or anywhere else in Israel?

Caesarea Philippi represented the worst that humans could sink to in terms of false beliefs and foul behaviour. A temple to Caesar, a shrine to false gods and a “worship” system that linked their religion to the worst of crude and animal behaviour, and all in full view of these Jewish men who would have been deeply offended by what they saw.

In this atmosphere of hell itself, Jesus forced them to evaluate Him and reach a verdict. And they did, represented by their mouthpiece, Peter. How could they ever miss the contrast between what they were seeing and what they had seen for the past few months or years of their lives? What had they seen and heard? An unfolding demonstration of the Father and an invitation to respond to His call to return, reconnect and reciprocate the love that He was pouring out upon them in a new realm of government called the kingdom of God.

What Jesus was offering them was so powerful that it would ultimately overcome even the most depraved, debauched and self-destructive behaviour that man could ever stoop to. So great and so powerful is the love of the Father that it can change and restore the very worst of human beings. What is the key? Unwavering confidence in Jesus as the Son of God. “Who is it that over comes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.” 1 John 5:5.

What is the significance of this confession? We have no hope of overcoming the power and influence of the ungodly world system outside of union with the Lord Jesus Christ and the power of His life in us that enables us to die to ourselves and live in Him alone. This is the only life that can represent the life of God that the world wants to see.

THE GOSPEL OF MARK – WHO DO YOU SAY THAT I AM?

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WHO DO YOU SAY THAT I AM?

27 Jesus and his disciples went on to the villages around Caesarea Philippi. On the way he asked them, “Who do people say I am?”
28 They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.”
29 “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”
Peter answered, “You are the Messiah.”
30 Jesus warned them not to tell anyone about him. Mark 8:27-30

This is the core and crux of Jesus’ entire ministry. “Who do you say that I am?” He was never out to recruit followers on the basis of the miracles He did. Miracles were only signs, pointers to His true identity as the Son of God. The essence of His mission was to reveal the Father and to restore all humanity to its original state as sons of God. His healing and deliverance miracles were evidence that who He was and what He did was the truth that authenticated His mission.

His query, “Who do the people say that I am?” was intended for His disciples, not for Him. He wanted them to realise that their association with Him had moved them beyond public opinion into a dimension of awareness and confidence in Him as God. Unless they were thoroughly convinced that this man, who walked the same earth and breathed the same air as they did, was actually from the other side, they would never stay with Him through the trials that lay ahead to demonstrate to the Jewish and pagan world that God had come to rescue them and reconcile them to Himself.

There has been a subtle shift in emphasis that has produced “believers” in what Jesus can do for people rather than people who are so convinced of His identity that they stick with Him, no matter what! By bowing the knee to Jesus as the Son of God, we give Him His rightful place as Lord. So many ministries today are based on “signs and wonders” and not on allegiance to Jesus as the Son of God.

The journey into faith for the disciples was long and progressive, culminating in Jesus’ death and the final, incontrovertible proof of His identity and mission – the resurrection. Without that, all the miracles in the world would have achieved nothing except prolong a few lives for a few more years. Unless we can respond to Jesus’ question with a resounding “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,” and stake our entire life on that confession, our faith is futile and will not stand under fire.