Mark 8:31–38 (ESV)
I would like to ask a question for your personal meditation. How do you become aware of God’s active presence being with you?
Reading the Book of Genesis, we are introduced to Avram. A person God would later re-named Avraham. This person was being drawn into knowledge of God. I believe the number one question asked over the years has been simply “why”?
We know him in English as Abraham; God found favor with this man. Avraham is the founder of our ethical belief in one God. He is regarded as the father of the faiths known as Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Why did God select him?
When we ask why this man found favor with God we must look at how he lived his life after he experienced God’s covenant. Consider When God judged destruction upon Sodom because of its evil and wicked people. Avraham argued with God, to save the lives of the righteous that lived there. However, remember Avraham did not argue with God for the life of his only son when God requested the sacrifice of Isaac. Here is why Avraham’s found favor with God. His faith in God was so strong he believed God would be merciful.
Paul addressed the promise God made Avraham because of his faith.
Romans 4:13–25 (ESV) 13 For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith. 14 For if it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. 15 For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression.
16 That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring—not only to the adherent of the law but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, 17 as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. 18 In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So shall your offspring be.” 19 He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. 20 No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, 21 fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. 22 That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.” 23 But the words “it was counted to him” were not written for his sake alone, 24 but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, 25 who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.
Abraham supported the interest of God instead of the ways of man. Our Lord Jesus Christ; had to serve as a Son of Man while being the Son of God. It was God’s intent for the Messiah to be a man of sorrows and suffering instead of being a comfortable living Messiah. Jesus spoke about his being the fulfillment of God’s prophecies; and how he would be a suffering servant.
Mark 8:31–38 (ESV)
31 And he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32 And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.
Consider the full force of the question. How did you become aware of God’s unseen hand revealing God’s active presence being with you? Are you setting your mind on the things of God or on the things of man?
This is what Peter did to deserve such a rebuke from Jesus. 33 But turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”
The Jewish community knew the teachings about the Messiah to come. However, their understanding came from the teachings of their religious leaders. Their religious leaders had a flaw in their ideas about what the Messiah would do for Israel. They promoted the thought of a warring Messiah whom would kick the invading army of Rome out of the Promised Land.
The religious leaders promoted a pride about Israel’s relationship with God based upon their being children of Abraham. Over the years, God had warned Israel about their sin being the cause of the loss of their homeland and their separation from God. The focus of the religious leaders was on their human desires instead of having a focus on the things of God. Our focus should always be on the more important matter, are we living like we love God?
Jesus spoke to the crowd and his disciples. 34 And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
A life’s decision needed to be made by the disciples. The decision was to either deny the interest of man or the interest of God. The disciples had to make a choice, remove them self from Jesus Christ and seek a comfortable lifestyle as human nature desires. We know the results of the decision; human desires lead to death. While eternal life is to seek living the interest of our Holy God.
Jesus spoke about a cross. The crowd and disciples would have understood the cross to be an instrument used by the Roman army for torture and execution. This form of punishment caused great agony upon the sufferer. For the disciples of Jesus it would serve as a trial of their faith. Would they be willing to follow their teacher as he is telling them he will suffer? The Romans custom called for the shamed person to carry his own cross upon which he would suffer and agonizing death.
What did Jesus mean; teaching his disciples to follow me? The Greek word described an action of an attendant accompanying him in a moral and spiritual way. This was not a temporary action. Like the actions of the crowds that followed for a short time and then returned back home to their interest. When disciples follow Jesus the Holy Spirit provides teachings for continuing to be in fellowship with Jesus. God’s interest is for disciples to become scholars of their teacher; Jesus Christ and to experience salvation. The disciples would know salvation in advance by cleaving to Jesus, believing and trusting in Jesus.
Jesus was asking his disciples to understand this method of following. The method was to see life as being in an inner moral and spiritual relationship with Jesus. This action was not just outward in appearance. It was not for a short-term period. This following action would include suffering even facing execution by those focused in worldly ways and not in the ways of God.
35 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it. 36 For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? 37 For what can a man give in return for his soul?
In the material world, saving means a deliverance from danger and suffering. Thru our spiritual relationship, we understand our saving is not temporary but eternal. Salvation comes immediately by the grace of God upon our acceptance of Jesus Christ. This saving action in the power of God saves our soul from the punishment for sin, which is death. The soul allows humankind to communicate with God. The soul’s desire is too know this reward of being in communication with God and God’s glory.
Does this make you wonder how we could ever been ashamed of Jesus and His words; even while living in this sinful generation?
38 For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”
The Greek word used in verse 38 to describe this adulterous and sinful generation was a word that described a frequently heinous and habitual sinner. A habitual sinner ignores the fact; God has rights upon their life.
When we accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Redeemer and Savior, we become the rightful possession of God. We acknowledge that our creation to be in the image of God and we have a duty to perform. Instead of fighting for the good comfortable life, we should focus serving the glory of God’s love.
God’s glory defines what we recognize God to be; it means what we perceive about His appearance, his honor, his reputation. When we fall short or are lacking in God’s glory that means our focus is on the ways of this material world instead of focusing on the interest of God. When humankind is focused upon the way of the world, humans are lacking a focus upon the image and character of God.
Jesus Christ is coming again, and soon. When Jesus comes; will the loving and saving grace of Jesus Christ be found in you?
Shannon is the daughter of my wife’s best friend and she is serving as a missionary to the people of India in the area where Mother Theresa had served. Her mother has shared with Sharon that Shannon has always been the girly girl who liked her hair and nails done and her clothes and shoes were always a priority. She has had a complete germ phobia and would have preferred to have a bubble around her and yet she is there serving in the dirty cities of India visiting those with leprosy who have been cast out even from their own families. For her to serve these people and share the Love of God with them has required a complete transformation and the Power of Jesus in her life as well as her focus to be continuously on the will of God in her life. Please remember her in prayer as she does His work
