A Pyrrhic Victory

A Pyrrhic Victory

Mark 8:31-38

Have you ever heard the saying, “They won the battle, but they lost the war?”

This is like a Pyrrhic (Pear rick) victory; which is a victory that ends up causing such a devastating toll on the victor, it ends up as a defeat, rather than a victory, due to its long term effects.

The phrase originated from a quote from a Greek King named Pyrrhus (pear-ess), whose triumph against Rome in 279 BC, killed so many of his own forces, it ended his battle with Rome.

The Greek king’s army managed to defeat the Romans in two major battles, coming into Italy with 25,000 men and 20 elephants, which the Romans had never seen before.

But later, the Greek King said to a friend that another victory against the Romans would “utterly undo him”; and ultimately, he lost to Rome in 275 BC.

Please open your Bibles to Mark 8 as we continue in that study

Last week, in Mark, we learned about a gradual healing.

Warren Wiersbe said, “Perhaps it was the atmosphere of unbelief in Bethsaida that hindered Him, or it may have been the spiritual condition of the man himself.” (Warren Wiersbe)

Then Jesus asked the most important question in history; and our answer to the question determines where we will spend eternity.

“Who do men say that I am?” Remember we said, “There is way too much evidence to simply say Jesus never existed”.

Then in vs. 29, Jesus looked right at them and asked, "But who do you say that I am?"

Jesus also said in Matthew 28:18 "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.” NKJV

So we ended last week saying, “Even though, the authority described in Matthew 28 was given to Jesus; He in turn, told us to go into the world, with His authority, to make disciples”.

Today, we will see what appeared to be a Pyrrhic (Pear rick) victory for Satan; but it was the Lord’s plan “A” from the start.

I. His cross.

Read Mark 8:31

Before going into detail about His death and crucifixion, Jesus commanded His Disciples to tell no one that He is the Messiah.

Jesus proved He was Messiah; but now, as the time draws near for His crucifixion, He says not to tell people He is Messiah.

We have said many times in the past that there are over 300 Old Testament prophecies concerning the Messiah. Jesus was the only One in all human history to fulfill those prophecies.

We have also mentioned in the past about the astronomical odds, against anyone even fulfilling just eight of those prophecies and yet, Jesus fulfilled them all.

Even though the Jewish people had learned those prophecies, the idea that the Messiah would suffer, was unthinkable to them.

After all, in their minds the Messiah was going to come and make everything right in the world, by defeating evil and putting an end to all injustice.

How could the Messiah possibly defeat evil and be victorious over Israel’s enemies, by being killed on a cross?

Try to imagine what was going on in the Disciple’s minds as they recount all of the promises and prophecies attributed to Messiah, while knowing Jesus was the Promised One.

These Disciples missed what a lot of the Jews still miss today: the Messiah first came as a Suffering Servant to deal with our sin issue; before He will come back as the conquering King.

I want to discuss some Old Testament prophecies that specifically foretold Messiah’s death and how He would die, years before crucifixion was even a normal practice in Rome.

These predictions of Messiah’s crucifixion happened well before crucifixion was used as a death penalty in the Rome Empire.

The pub-med website states that crucifixion was introduced to Rome in the 3rd century BC and they perfected crucifixion until it was abolished by Constantine I in the 4th century AD.

“Crucifixion was applied mostly to slaves, disgraced soldiers, Christians and foreigners-very rarely to Roman citizens.”

Zechariah was written roughly 500 years before Christ and hundreds of years before crucifixion was introduced to Rome.

The Lord, speaking of the coming deliverance of Judah said in Zechariah 12:10 (a), "And I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication…

Zechariah 12:10(b) then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn.

Jesus knew He was going to suffer and be killed; but, He also knew He would be raised the third day.

Isaiah 53:3 He is despised and rejected by men, A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.