Central theme: Jesus denied himself and took the punishment for us with total dedication. We should take up the cross and follow Jesus, which means denying our old self (our comfort, your desires) and live for God because God is leading us to an even better place.
Opening:
Think of a place you really want to visit. A place that you always dream about going to someday. Where would that be?
Raise your hand if it’s somewhere in South America, Asia, the US, Europe, Africa?
The original plan of Simon from Cyrene:
There was a man in the bible, and he was on the journey of his dreams. His name was Simon. He wanted to go on this very special trip to Jerusalem. He is a Jew and he grew up in a city called Cyrene, which is in northern Africa in today’s Libya. That means his trip going to Jerusalem would be more than 1000 kilometers away. And he didn’t just want to go during any time of the year, he especially wanted to go Jerusalem during the time of the Passover. Because since he was young, he heard about these fascinating story about the Passover. How his ancestors put the blood of the lamb on the door frames, and the angel of death would come and pass over their house because of the blood. Back in those days, there was no Uber, there was no Ryanair budget airline. It’s gonna cost him his life savings. But he didn’t care. So Simon took his two sons and started a long journey that involved boats and lots of walking that’s gonna take a whole month. They finally got into Jerusalem. He was so excited when he got there. There were lots of people in the city. But he was a bit confused because there seems to be a commotion going on. There were lots of shouting, some people were crying, what’s going on there? So Simon, taking his sons, walked closer to the crowd. There he saw the soldiers taking three criminals in a parade. They were carrying the beams of their crosses, while the soldiers were beating them and telling them to move along. But there was one of them that the people especially want him killed. On his sign it said, “The King of the Jews”.
Introduction:
We are going through the series on #Jesus, where we focus on the last 24 hours of Jesus’ life before he died on the cross. We started with Jesus’ last supper with his disciples. Then we talked about his prayer in the garden of Gethsemane where he asked the father to take the cup away from him, “yet not what I will, but what you will.” Last week we talked about Peter and how he denied Jesus three times in the midst of fear. The running theme is that Jesus freed us from guilt, from half-heartedness, from fear. And today we will pick up from where Jesus was arrested and focus on his journey from the court of Pilate to the place he was to be executed. A journey where he experienced not only extreme physical pain, but also extreme mental humiliation and shame.
Let’s read Mark 15:15-24
15 Wanting to satisfy the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas to them. He had Jesus flogged, and handed him over to be crucified.
16 The soldiers led Jesus away into the palace (that is, the Praetorium) and called together the whole company of soldiers. 17 They put a purple robe on him, then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on him. 18 And they began to call out to him, “Hail, king of the Jews!” 19 Again and again they struck him on the head with a staff and spit on him. Falling on their knees, they paid homage to him.20 And when they had mocked him, they took off the purple robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him out to crucify him.
21 A certain man from Cyrene, Simon, the father of Alexander and Rufus, was passing by on his way in from the country, and they forced him to carry the cross.22 They brought Jesus to the place called Golgotha (which means “the place of the skull”). 23 Then they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. 24 And they crucified him. Dividing up his clothes, they cast lots to see what each would get.
The crowd:
The cruxificion is hands down the most horrific form of punishment. Not only does it bring exterme physical suffering, it also strips you of all kinds of dignity. It’s a total punishment.
The Hills of Golgotha is located just outside of the walls in Jerusalem. And the crowd is watching and mocking Jesus. But I wonder, why are the people so mean to Jesus? Just a week before, the crowd welcomed Jesus as he entered Jerusalem on a donkey. He came in as the Prince of Peace. They put their clothes and branches on the road, as a sign of submission. But just a week later, the crowd mocked him and wanted him to die.
What happened? The way that the crowd was mocking Jesus, gave us a glimpse of what was in their hearts. The people saw the two thieves going to be crucified. They are robbers, and they were carrying the cross. Ok, I can understand this picture. But Jesus, you said you are a King! Your claims are so great. But your ways are so weak. Let me tell you what a King should look like. I am expecting my Messiah, my King, to overthrow the Roman rule. It’s about time now. But you are dying now. If you are the King, I cannot spit on you. If you are the Son of God, I cannot do this to you and this to you. The crowd couldn’t fit into their little brains just what good can this bring. And certainly, no good can come from death. You disappoint me. And so they are witnessing the greatest thing that has ever happened in history, and they missed it. They wanted a God that solves their immediate needs. And as soon as this King couldn’t satisfy their own desires, they mock.
If Jerusalem is a symbol of God’s people, then I wonder if we couldn’t see a little bit of ourselves in this picture. A part of us worship God, but in another part of our lives we mock Jesus. We welcome a God who brings blessings, but as soon as things are not going the way we wanted, we become hard. We despise. We come to church and sing praises, but we don’t want him to rule in other parts of our lives. If you are a God, you won’t let this happen. Or if you’re a God, you will give me this thing that I have always wanted. We seem to know better than God, how life is supposed to go.
The crowd completely missed the point.
Jesus:
Irony: Jesus is King
But this part of scripture is so ironic. The people think they are being ironic by giving Jesus the crown of thorns. You said you’re the King, here’s the crown, ha ha ha. And let me give you a purple robe because you are so royal. And they paid homage to him to fake worship him. Oh, why don’t you save yourself huh? But the irony of the irony is true. When the people are mocking Jesus, they are actually correctly identifying who Jesus really is.
The fact that Jesus didn’t save himself shows us that he IS the real King of the Jews. The torture and the humilation show what we humans are capable of: anger, pride, fear, greed. And it is exactly for these reasons, that Jesus had to suffer. The more they mock, the more they need Jesus. Being the king of the Jews requires him to stay on the cross. Taking that humiliation and shame IS a part of the sacrifice.
But why did he have to be that suffering servant?
Why? What is missing is us:
When Jesus was on earth he healed those who were sick. Jesus drove out the evil spirits. Even the storm listened to him. He raised Lazarus from the dead. He was giving the people what they want. He is the creator of this earth. A few nails couldn’t hold him to the cross.
And he was already glorifying God when he is in heaven with God. So what was missing where he was? Us.
He was missing us.
And to bring us back there needs to be a ransom.
In Leviticus 17:11 it says:
“it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life.”
If he had come down from the cross, that would show that there is a limit to the love.
But instead, Jesus fulfilled the prophecy from Isaiah 53 to the end where it says:
“Surely he took up our pain
and bore our suffering,
yet we considered him punished by God,
stricken by him, and afflicted.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him,
and by his wounds we are healed.
6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to our own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.”
When it says the people offered him wine mixed with myrrh, which is sort of a drug that would numb the pain a bit. He didn’t take it. Jesus wants to take the shame and pain that we deserve in full awareness and in totality. He will drink the cup the father had given him to the last drop.
So in the greatest act of self-control, an all-powerful God totally denied himself and became weak, stayed weak, and in total surrender he took our shame.
Jesus has given us everything. He is telling us: there isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for you.
That is how a true King looks like.
The encounter of Jesus and Simon: What does that mean for us?
And then, as this true King, which no one can recognize, was walking towards the execution site, there was this encounter of Simon and Jesus.
Simon was part of the crowd up until that time.
And Jesus was so beaten up that he couldn’t carry the heavy beam anymore
And Simon, that lucky man among thousands of people who were watching, was chosen by the soldiers to carry the cross for Jesus.
When I listened to the story when I was young, I always thought Simon volunteered because he’s so kind, but no, it says he was forced to take the cross.
The bible didn’t say much about Simon from Cyrene except that he was with his two sons. But we can imagine what would be his reaction.
Surprise. Out of all these people, you chose me? I’m not even from here! I’m from Africa man! I’m just passing by.
Or maybe he feels a bit annoyed. Hey I’m not here for this. I want to go to the Passover, remember? I need to go to the place of sacrifice. If I touch this criminal’s blood, I would be unclean, and I would be unfit to take part of the passover meal. Man, this is not where I want to be!
So he reluctantly took up the cross, and walked with Jesus. On the way he heard people shouting. People continued to heap insults on him.
But now that he gets to be up close and personal with Jesus, he looked over and he didn’t see anger in Jesus. He didn’t see regret either. He saw a man of….wait, that can’t be right…. compassion? His eyes were filled with … wait, gratitude? He loves these people?
With every insult, Jesus only responded by taking a step closer to the hill of Golgotha.
With the people mocking, he heard Jesus said, “Father, forgive them. They know not what they do.”
These can’t be the words of a criminal.
As Simon stepped out of the crowd, and experienced Jesus, his life changed.
It’s a bit strange when you first read the passage, of all the things Mark could describe about Simon, he only mentioned he brought his two sons, Alexander and Rufus. He even told us their names. It was so random. Why? Commentaries tell us that the only reason why the author Mark included the name of his two sons, is because his readers would recognize who they are. Alexander and Rufus became believers of the early church. In Paul’s writing in Romans 16, the apostle Paul even mentioned Rufus and thanked Rufus’s mother, Simon’s wife, for being like a mother to him too.
13 Greet Rufus, chosen in the Lord, and his mother, who has been a mother to me, too.
Simon’s family became Christian followers because of this encounter.
Simon missed going to the passover meal, but he realised he actually carried the cross of the real passover lamb.
Take up the cross
This is the picture that Jesus wanted and talked about earlier in Mark ch. 8. He predicted his death and told the disciples, “I’m gonna die. But I will rise again.” But his disciples were really concerned and Peter even took Jesus aside and said, “hey man! how could you say something like this? You cannot die!”
And Jesus in response, in Mark 8: 33-36 it says:
“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.”
34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be 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.”
We see many people wearing the symbol of a cross. It’s in our jewelry. It’s in our home. What is the cross a symbol of? The cross is a symbol for death. To take up our cross means our old self is dead. It is total submission. It means to deny our own desires and follow Jesus. It means to concern about the things that God is concerned about. It means to treasure Jesus more than we treasure human approval, more than we treasure comfort. It means to give our dream to God, and let him take you to where you need to go.
The picture
I love the picture of the encounter.
The crowd completely missed it. But as Simon took the cross and walked behind Jesus, he went from being a part of the crowd, to becoming a part of the story.
Afterall, this passage is about someone going to a place he dreamed about.
But Simon from Cyrene wasn’t the main character. This passage isn’t about Simon’s journey to the Passover getting an inconvenient detour. It is about God going to a place he has always wanted to go to. That is back to the garden with us. The all-powerful God could have taken a detour, but out of love he denied his rights instead, and in full submission he went to the cross. So that we can have life in him.
The story of “Sherry”:
More than ten years ago when I was still living in San Francisco, I was leading a youth group in my church. There was this girl named Sherry. She is a teenage girl from Taiwan with long hair, beautiful smile, friendly, and sporty. We developed a close friendship and somehow she’d rather hang out with me than other girls with similar age. One time I asked her, “why don’t you spend time with the other girls in the group.” And she said, “I don’t know, I guess I’ve always enjoyed hanging out with old people.” “….”
One day I was talking to my ex college roommate. It’s the same beautiful lady who has everything I talked about in my last sermon. At that time she wasn’t a Christian yet and she was telling me all beautiful places she’s been to. She asked me, “have you been to Monterey?” “No…” “Oh I went and it was amazing, you should go!” “We are going to Carmel, do you want to join us?” I said, “sorry I can’t, I have church commitments.” During that time, I spent a lot of time with the youth. I was at church 3, 4 times a week. And after talking to her, I struggled. Because somehow I felt, yeah, why didn’t I just enjoy my life and just go to all these places? I started to feel embarrassed. And I wrestle with God about that, I asked, “God, am I just stupid? Why should I do all of that anyways?” And sometime later, a colleague asked me if I want to go whitewater rafting in the American river and camping out there for a weekend. Now I don’t particularly like roughing it. I am not a big fan of dangerous sports. Especially when the name of one of the rapids is called “The Meat Grinder”. And the thought of potentially falling into the water into the meat grinder is not exactly appealing. But just because of my inner protest and maybe subconsciously to mock him, I said “yes I’ll go!”
We had no mobile phone reception for the most part of the trip. On the way back, when I finally got signal again, there was a voicemail left a day before. And it was from Sherry’s mom. She sounded distressed. She told me that something’s wrong with Sherry and asked if I could come. She’s not well.
I called her right back and drove to her place right away. It turned out that Sherry is bipolar, which I had absolutely no idea about. I was shocked. She’s normally very sweet, very happy. But when I saw her she lost her motor skills, and couldn’t move her arm, she couldn’t walk like normal. She looked different. And she would claim that she sees there’s a wall in front of her when there isn’t. And I have absolutely no experience dealing with it. Her mom told me that it runs in her family, her uncle has that too, and only under extreme stress would she become like that. It only happened a couple times in her life. And she has been very stressed in school. It happened over the weekend, and after it happened, her mom said she wanted to see me.
But I wasn’t there.
I visited her and called her almost everyday for weeks, but I can’t get it out of my mind that the moment she needed me the most, I wasn’t there. I missed the cross. That was the opportunity for me to show her she is not alone. That was the moment I can tell her that she is loved by God and I care about her. I missed the moments of life where I could share the glory of God.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying you shouldn’t have fun. I, of all people, am a huge fan of traveling and doing what you love. But in answering my intense prayer and struggle about why I am serving Him, God opened my eyes to see what is more valuable in life. Of course I can have a life that is only about today. But I would have missed this.
Don’t miss the cross.
Application: Take up your cross
Many of us are like Simon sometimes. We don’t come to church to look for a cross to carry. There may be other reasons why you are here. But God says, “I can use it. I can meet you wherever you are.” Sometimes you find the cross, or sometimes the cross finds you. But when you encounter it, take up the cross, because through it, you experience the abundant life that God has in store for you.
The cross could mean being there for someone who needs help. Maybe someone you know who is struggling with his faith. I believe there are certain people that only you can reach. Or the cross could be you going through a hard time and you don’t see what good this can bring. Or the cross could be injustices you see and you can’t pretend you don’t see it anymore. Or it could simply be a new person walking into the church and no one is welcoming them. Your old self would tell you: just stay where you are where it’s comfortable. Leave it alone. Be selfish. Stay with the crowd.
But Jesus came to carry the cross we couldn’t carry so that we can be free. Among many things, he freed us from passivity. He’s not a passive God. He was at work since the beginning. His ways may not be what you expected. But he didn’t call us to be on the sideline.
Jim Elliot is a missionary who literally carried the cross and died while sharing the gospel to one of the most dangerous tribal groups in Ecuador. In his journal he says, “He is no fool, who gives what he cannot keep, to gain that which he cannot lose.”
Do you really see Jesus as a King or are you just mocking him? If you see him as your King, then take up that cross and expect to share in his glory.
Reflection:
- What do you think is the cross for you at the moment? How will you deny yourself and carry it for the glory of God?
