Divine Vandalism - Mark 15:35-39 Series

Introduction

Is God our Savior? It depends on your definition of saving. A lot of things depend on your definition of saving. Being rescued means you’re in trouble and God delivers you from that trouble. But if your concept of trouble and your idea of what it means to be saved from it don’t line up with God’s definitions, then you will find yourself very disappointed with God, and you might miss real salvation altogether.

Review

We left off last time with Jesus crying out to God from the cross after three hours of darkness.

Mark 15:33 At the sixth hour darkness came upon the whole land until the ninth hour.

The last few sessions we’ve looked at the rich significance of that terrible, suffocating abyss that descended on Jesus. People debate about whether Jesus went into hell after he died. I don’t believe he did, but I do believe he was there before he died. You don’t have to go anywhere to be in hell. All it takes is for God to turn the light of his face away from you, and that’s what happened to Jesus his last three hours on the cross. Instead of saying Jesus descended into hell, I would say hell descended onto Jesus. And after that happened, Jesus said “It is finished” because it was finished. He didn’t have to go anywhere after that except into paradise.

At the end of those three hours, Jesus shouts the opening line of Psalm 22.

34 And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?"--which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

We’ve talked a lot about what Jesus meant by that, but now let’s take a look at how the people took it.

35 When some of those standing near heard this, they said, "Listen, he's calling Elijah." 36 One man ran, filled a sponge with wine vinegar, put it on a stick, and offered it to Jesus to drink. "Now leave him alone. Let's see if Elijah comes to take him down," he said.

The Elijah Experiment

Expectations about Elijah

Jesus says eloi in Aramaic, it sounds vaguely like Elijah, and immediately they think of Malachi 4:5.

Malachi 4:5 See, I will send you the prophet Elijah before that great and dreadful day of the Lord comes.

They believed the thing that would validate the Messiah was the return of Elijah. And what would Elijah do? Obviously, he would start by rescuing Jesus from this trouble he’s in. That was their concept of salvation. Salvation is very simple: We get in trouble; God gets us out of it. That’s the long and short of what salvation means to most people—for God to rescue me from what I perceive as trouble.

So for someone to be taken seriously as a potential Messiah, he would have to have that same mindset. He’d have to be a man who really knew how to get God to solve his problems. So if Elijah doesn’t come, we’re justified in rejecting him as a fraud.

“Let’s See”

But if Elijah does come, that would be pretty cool to see.

36 One man ran, filled a sponge with wine vinegar (a common drink for quenching thirst ), put it on a stick, and offered it to Jesus to drink. "Now leave him alone. Let's see if Elijah comes to take him down," he said.

Maybe this guy’s mocking Jesus along with the crowd, but in the back of his mind, he wondering. We know the darkness had an impact on the people. And he thinks, “We’ve got some supernatural things going on here—could it be Jesus really is from God? No, it can’t be. But what if …? Sure would be cool to see Elijah come.”

Whatever he was thinking, one thing is clear—they are convinced that if Jesus really is the Messiah, God would rescue him from the cross. That’s their idea of salvation which is yet another example of how they were focused on little life rather than big life. When Jesus said, “If you save your life you will lose it” this concept of salvation is exactly the kind of thing he had in mind. If your idea of being saved is preserving this little, immedi-ate, right here and now life, you’ll lose everything. True salvation starts with giving this little life up.

What’s the right way to think about salvation and Elijah’s role? Let’s go back and re-view what we’ve learned about Elijah previously in the book.

Jesus Is Greater than Elijah

The most memorable passage is the Transfiguration, where Elijah actually showed up in person. Elijah and Moses appeared and Peter made that dopey comment about building three shelters for Moses, Elijah, and Jesus. “Jesus, you’re so great—you’re right up there with the likes of Moses and Elijah!” But then Moses and Elijah disappear leaving Jesus standing alone and God says, “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.” Jesus is the eternal Son of God who shares God’s glory, he’s far greater than Elijah and Moses, and his word supersedes even the law and the prophets.