As I as watching a Lakers game this last week, I saw Kobe Bryant put on an amazing shooting performance. Kobe set an NBA record by making 12 three point shots during the game, nine of the shots he made in a row. It was truly amazing to watch. I was excited, the fans at Staples Center were excited, Kobe’s teammates were excited. But I don’t think anyone was more excited than McDonalds. You see, Kobe is a celebrity spokesperson for McDonalds, so when Kobe does something amazing, it’s more publicity for McDonalds. In fact, I bet Sprite, Spalding, and Top Deck were all excited too, because Kobe Bryant is also a celebrity spokesperson for them as well.
Celebrity endorsements have become a regular part of sports and advertising. Whether it’s NFL quarterback Kurt Warner and his mom selling Campbell’s soup or Tiger Woods selling Nike shoes, every major corporation wants a celebrity spokesperson. In fact, some athletes make more money in their endorsements than they could ever hope to make competing in their sport.
Well I think many groups would love to have Jesus as their celebrity spokesperson. After all Jesus has a good image in the minds of many people. Most people in America view Jesus as honest and trustworthy. So if a movement or a group can make it appear that their ideas were endorsed by Jesus, that helps sell their ideas to the public. In fact, some people have done just that. Almost every single cultic religious group born in America, no matter how bizarre their beliefs, appeals to Jesus to endorse their beliefs. We saw this with Jim Jones and the People’s Temple in the 1970s. We also saw it with David Koresh and the Branch Davidians in the 1990s.
A few years ago the animal rights group PETA (People For the Ethical Treatment of Animals) launched a nationwide campaign to promote a vegetarian diet. Part of their campaign was a series of billboards and ads that showed an artistic rendition of Jesus, and underneath it claimed that Jesus was a vegetarian. If Jesus was a vegetarian, we should be too. Of course I went to PETA’s web site to find out what lost historical data they’d discovered to support their claim that Jesus was a vegetarian. And of course there was none. Never mind the fact that Jesus celebrated the Jewish Passover with his disciples, which involved the eating of a lamb. Nevermind that he fed people fish and bread. I guess they missed those parts of the Bible. The folks at PETA simply thought it would persuade more people to become vegetarians if they claimed that Jesus was a vegetarian.
PETA might be brazen in their attempt to highjack Jesus for their own agenda, but they’re certainly not the only group to do it. All I can say about groups that do this is that Jesus isn’t who you think he is.
Today we’re going to see that Jesus’ first followers were also confused about who he was. They had the same tendency to try to push their own agenda on Jesus. I suppose we all struggle with the same thing. We’ve been in a series through the New Testament book of Mark called Following Jesus in the Real World. Today we come to the heart of the book of Mark, the center point of Mark’s story. The event we look at today is a hinge in the story. And we’re going to see that virtually everyone was wrong about who Jesus was.
1. Our Confession (Mark 8:27-30)
Look at vv. 27-30. Peter’s confession here of Jesus as the Christ stands as the climax of the first 8 chapters of the book of Mark.The question of who Jesus is has dominated the book of Mark from the very first chapter. In the first verse, Mark told us that he was writing an account of the origin of the message of Jesus the Christ, the Son of God (1:1). As the storyteller, Mark knows exactly who Jesus is, but the people he describes meeting Jesus seem totally in the dark about who Jesus is until now. In the second chapter, the religious leaders were offended when Jesus forgave a man’s sins; they said, "Who can forgive sins but God alone?" In the fourth chapter, when Jesus stills a storm, his disciples ask, "Who is this that even the winds and the waves obey him?" (4:41). In his home town of Nazareth in chapter 6 the people ask, "Where did Jesus get this ability?" (6:2).
Everyone’s trying to figure out who Jesus is.
And the irony is that while none of the people understand who Jesus is before Peter’s confession here, the demons have known throughout the story perfectly well who Jesus is. In chapter 1 a demon cries out, "I know who you are, the Holy One of God" (1:24). In chapter 3 we learned that whenever Jesus came in contact with demons they cried out, "You are God’s Son" (3:11). In chapter 5, the man with a legion of demons calls Jesus "the Son of the Most High God" (5:7). Each time a demon announces who Jesus is, Jesus silences the demon from any further announcement. I’ll explain why I think Jesus silenced the demons in a minute.
Mark tells us that Peter’s confession occurred while they were walking to a city called Caesara Philippi. Now this city was located the furthest north a person could go in Israel and still be in Israel. Caesarea Philippi is in modern day Syria, and it was a region dominated by paganism. Caesarea Philippi was a place where the Roman Emperor was worshipped as a god. There was also a pagan temple devoted to the Greek god Pan.
Jesus asks his followers what popular opinion says about who he is. We already know that the theologians thought Jesus was demon possessed; we learned that back in chapter 3 (3:22). We also learned in that chapter that Jesus’ mother and siblings believed that Jesus had gone off the deep end, that he’d lost his mind (3:31). But popular opinion was that Jesus was a prophet; that was the category they put Jesus in. They associated Jesus with his cousin John the Baptist, and with the ancient prophets of old like Elijah.
But when Jesus asks his followers what they think, they know he’s more than a prophet. Peter seems to act as the spokesperson for all of the disciples when he says, "You are the Christ." This is the first time any character other than a demon has recognized Jesus as the Christ.
Now the word "Christ" is the Greek word for Messiah or Anointed One. Back in Israel in the Old Testament, three kinds of leaders were anointed with oil when they were appointed to their leadership post: prophets, priests, and kings. So the word "Christ" or "Messiah" was associated with a person who filled one of those three roles. But by Jesus’ day, the Messiah or the Anointed One was thought of in purely kingly terms.
Jesus tells Peter that he needs to keep it quiet for now. Just as Jesus silenced the demons, now he silences Peter. We’ve encountered this silencing motif before in Mark. When Jesus heals people, he tells them to keep it quiet. When demons cry out, Jesus silences them.
I believe part of the reason for this is due to the fact that the title "Christ" had come to carry military and political associations. This is probably why Jesus himself avoided using the term "Christ" to describe himself, even though we learned in the first verse of Mark that he is the Christ. Before Jesus could freely use the word "Christ" he had to help people see the word "Christ" in a new way.
But here in Peter’s confession we find every Christian’s confession as well. AS FOLLOWERS OF JESUS, WE BELIEVE THAT JESUS IS GOD’S PROMISED MESSIAH.
To call Jesus the Christ or the Messiah means we believe that Jesus is God’s promised one. We believe that Jesus was able to do that which no one else had ever been able to do before, and no one will be able to do since. There’ve been many prophets in the history of the human race, many holy men and women, many inspired teachers, many heroic examples, but only one Messiah. To call Jesus the Messiah means that we believe God’s mark was on Jesus, that Jesus was uniquely empowered and anointed to bring us into a relationship with God.
There are many groups in our world that say they believe in Jesus but don’t believe Jesus is the Christ. For example, the religion of Islam believes Jesus to be a prophet. The Bahai religion believes Jesus to be one of seven different manifestations of God. The Hindu religion believes Jesus to be one god among many other gods. Some modern historians believe Jesus was a social reformer, a kind of Jewish Martin Luther King in the ancient world.
But to be a Christian is to believe that Jesus is more than any of these things; it’s to believe with the earliest disciples that Jesus is the Christ.
2. What Kind of Messiah? (Mark 8:31-33)
You’d think with Peter’s confession that he’d moved to the head of his class; but it doesn’t last long. Look at vv. 31-33. Notice Jesus prefers the title "Son of Man" to the title "Christ." The title "Son of Man" also came from the Old Testament, it was a messianic title. But "Son of Man" didn’t have any of the military or political associations that the word "Christ" had. It was a relatively obscure title that came from the book of Daniel, and this is the title Jesus prefers to use to describe himself.
You see, Peter was correct about who Jesus was, but he was deeply wrong in his understanding of what the Christ would be like. In Jesus’ day the word "Christ" was synonymous with winner. The Christ was the conquering hero, the rider on a white horse, the action hero who would humiliate the pagan Roman armies and reestablish Israel’s greatness and dominance. Listen to these words from a first century Jewish writer about the Messiah:
"How fine is the King, the Messiah, who will arise from those of the house of Judah! He girds his loins and goes forth and sets up the ranks of battle against his enemies and kills the kings together with their commanders…He reddens the mountains with the blood of their slain and his garments are dipped in blood" (Targum Yerushalbi on Genesis 49:11, cited in Garland, Mark, p. 326).
This is the kind of Messiah people wanted, and the word "Christ" had come to be associated with these things.
But Jesus is going to correct their misconceptions as they journey south to Jerusalem. This journey south from the northernmost part of Israel will be a reeducation of the disciples. Very plainly and clearly Jesus begins the reeducation process by telling them that he will suffer, be rejected and ultimately be killed. The word "must" here doesn’t just mean his suffering is inevitable, but it’s a word that describes something that’s ordained by God. By saying these things must happen, Jesus is saying that his suffering, rejection and death are part of God’s plan.
The suffering of course refers to his humiliation prior to his death. And in popular opinion, the words "suffer" and "Christ" didn’t go together, unless of course it was the suffering inflicted on the pagans by the Christ. A suffering Christ was a contradiction in terms, like the phrase "underachieving all star" or "losing most valuable player." It was an oxymoron, so it must’ve seemed like Jesus was talking nonsense.
The rejection of Jesus would come at the hands of all the leaders within Israel. The elders were the lay people, somewhat similar to the lay elders on our elder board. The priests were the clergy, the people who drew their living from service in the temple. The priests might be somewhat analogous to pastors and ministers in churches today. The teachers of the law were the theologians, the Bible scholars. These three groups together comprised the Sanhedrin, the official religious authority in Israel. The people who were supposed to be ready for the Messiah are the very ones who would reject him. Again, the word "rejection" was simply not a word that would go with the word "Christ." The Messiah would be welcomed, embraced, not rejected, especially not by the religious leaders.
The death would come at the hands of the Romans in Jesus’ crucifixion. This particular Greek word for "death" always means death by violence. It means to be killed, to be murdered, to be executed. And once again, this was simply not a word that went with the word "Christ," unless of course it was the Messiah swinging his sword and slaughtering the hated pagan Romans.
The rising again refers to the resurrection of Jesus. Now the Jewish people expected a general resurrection at the end of history, when all people would rise from the grave. But the idea of one person rising from the grave before that time was a new idea, something that was unprecedented in Hebrew thought.
Peter takes Jesus aside to rebuke him for such a distorted and messed up understanding of what it means to be the Christ. Peter moves from his role behind Jesus as a disciple, to take a place in front of Jesus. He stands in front of Jesus, between Jesus and Jerusalem.
But as the words of rebuke come from Peter’s lips, Jesus rebukes Peter back. "Get behind me Satan! You don’t have in mind the things of God but the things of men." By saying, "Get behind me," Jesus is telling Peter to take his rightful place as a disciple, to stop pushing his own agenda on Jesus and to get in line.
By using the term "Satan," Jesus sees in Peter’s rebuke an attempt of the evil one to cause Jesus to swerve from his path. Surely a conquering Messiah riding on a white horse would’ve been more appealing to Jesus. Can you imagine a kind of Messianic Arnold Schwartznegger riding into Jerusalem on a Harley Davidson, driving out the Roman soldiers saying, "Hasta la vista baby." Can you see the Roman governor telling him to surrender, and the Messiah looking up and saying, "Thanks for your advice" and then blowing up the governor’s mansion? That’s the kind of Messiah Peter wanted, and perhaps that’s the kind of Messiah Satan was tempting Jesus to be at this moment. But Jesus knows that this was thinking the things of men, not the things of God.
Here we find an important qualification to our belief that Jesus is the Messiah. AS FOLLOWERS OF JESUS, BE BELIEVE JESUS IS THE MESSIAH, BUT OUR IDEAS ABOUT WHAT A MESSIAH IS SUPPOSED TO BE DOESN’T ALWAYS FIT JESUS.
There was the Messiah people wanted Jesus to be and the Messiah God intended Jesus to be, and these were two very different ideas. And sometimes we want the Arnold Schwarzenegger type Messiah as well. Christians want Jesus to ride up on a white horse, silencing our critics and shaming all our adversaries. We want a Messiah who will vindicate our rights, to show the world that we’re right and they’re wrong. We want a Messiah who gets our favorite candidate elected, our legislation passed, our ideas promoted. But Jesus doesn’t always fit our idea of what a Messiah is supposed to be either.
It’s amazing how two people can use the exact same words but mean entirely different things. Take for example the phrase, "Jesus is God’s Son." To me as an evangelical Christian, to say, "Jesus is God’s Son," means Jesus is the second person of the holy trinity, fully human and fully God. But to a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints the exact same phrase means Jesus is the spirit brother of Lucifer, one of many gods who inhabit the universe. To a member of the Watchtower Bible & Tract Society the same phrase means that Jesus is a creation of God, an angel. To a member of a new age group like Astara here in Upland the same phrase means, "Jesus is a child of God just like we’re all children of God; Jesus is divine in the same sense that we’re all divine." So without further definition, the phrase "Jesus is God’s Son" can mean lots of different things.
If we believe Jesus to be the Messiah, we must take his definition of what a Messiah is supposed to do rather than our own.
3. Following A Suffering Messiah (8:34-9:1)
We can’t be followers of Jesus unless we accept his definition of the Messiah . Look at vv. 34 through 9:1. I’ve included 9:1 with this section because grammatically it fits with chapter 8 rather than chapter 9.
This is a call to follow, an invitation to become a follower of Jesus. This call is addressed to people who are already following him--people like Peter and the other apostles--but it’s also addressed to the crowd as well. This call to follow isn’t exactly a winning marketing campaign that a consultant would suggest.
Jesus’ words here have three specific commands. The first command is to deny ourselves. It’s important to note that Jesus isn’t telling us to deny things to ourselves. The idea of denying things to ourselves, like denying ourselves food or rest or sleep is what’s called asceticism. That’s not what Jesus is talking about here. What Jesus is talking about goes much deeper than asceticism. Do deny ourselves is to displace our ego as the central part of our lives. To deny ourselves is to defer the decision making of our lives to Jesus, to voluntarily yield our rights to him. The German theologian Deitrich Bonhoeffer said, "To deny oneself is to be aware only of Christ and no more of self, to see only him who goes before us" (cited in Garland 333).
The second command is to pick up our cross. When the Romans condemned a person to die, that person had to pick up and carry their own cross to the place of execution. Now nothing was as symbolic of the Roman government’s oppression of the nation of Israel more than the cross. You see, the Romans used crucifixion as a form of intimidation, reserving death on the cross only for revolutionaries, people who resisted Roman domination. So the cross was a constant reminder to Jewish people that they weren’t free, but that they were under the iron fist of Roman occupation. For Jesus to speak of us taking up our cross, he was speaking of our willingness to suffer humiliation and shame in following him.
It’s a tragedy that in contemporary Christian culture taking up our cross has been reduced to putting up with irritating situations. If I have a mean boss, I say, "That’s my cross to bear." If the people at school tease me, Christian friends say, "Don’t worry. That’s just your cross to bear." But taking up our cross is much more than putting up with irritating people. To take up our cross is to wholeheartedly embrace God’s will for our lives, even if it means suffering, even if it means utter humiliation, and even if it means death. The three medical missionaries gunned down in Yemen a few weeks ago took up their crosses.
Jesus’ call here reminds me of the advertisement Earnest Shackleton took out to find people to join his sailing expedition to Antarctica.
"Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages. Bitter cold. Long months of complete darkness. Constant danger. Safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success."
Over 5,000 people responded to that ad because the cost was put up front, just as Jesus is doing here.
The third command is to follow Jesus, to be a disciple.
Then Jesus describes a paradox, that people who wish to cling to their lives will in the end lose everything. But people who abandon their attempts to fill their lives with what they want, these are the very people who find life. It’s the old paradox noted by philosophers down through the ages. Happiness in life is never found through the front door by pursuing it directly. We may have the right to pursue our own happiness in our nation, but people who pursue their own happiness never really find it. When we make our own happiness the highest goal of our lives, we find ourselves the least happy. It’s only people who abandon the pursuit of their own happiness to pursue something higher, like following Jesus, that find true happiness. You can only enter the good life through the back door of abandoning your attempts to get the good life. Surrendering ourselves to Jesus up front opens the door to real, abundant life.
What good would it be to fill our lives with everything we’d ever want if we lose our very soul in the end? Are the possessions and the thrills worth total ruin? Nothing’s worth total ruin, not even the whole world.
Those who are ashamed of Jesus and who reject his suffering can expect no help from Jesus when they stand before God on the other side of death. If we spurn Christ’s message and reject his Lordship, we have no reason to expect his mercy when this life is over and we’re finally held accountable to all the decisions we made in our lives. If we have rejected Christ’s identity and refused to submit ourselves to his gospel, he will be embarrassed at us at the end of the age. This is a sobering thought, a sobering especially to anyone who merely flirts with following Jesus but never really makes a decision.
Some people have thought that chapter 9 verse 1 refers to the end of the world. And if that’s the case, then Jesus thought the end of the world would happen in his lifetime. That would create a problem for us, because obviously the world didn’t end in Jesus’ lifetime. However, that would seem like an odd way to understand this verse because it literally reads, "There are some standing here will not taste death until after they see the kingdom of God come with power." If the kingdom of God coming with power is the end of the world, when death is finally abolished, it would seem odd that Jesus would say that these guys would die after they witness all that. You see, Jesus is saying that some of the people he’s talking to here would die after they see God’s kingdom come in power. So clearly the coming of the kingdom in power isn’t the end of the world, but something else. I think it refers to the resurrection of Jesus Christ, where Jesus is vindicated as God’s Son.
Now these words here are sobering words. We learn here that FOLLOWING A SUFFERING MESSIAH MEANS WE ARE READY TO SUFFER OURSELVES.
Being a Christian isn’t merely fitting Jesus into our lives or getting religious on Sundays or Saturday nights. Being a Christian is a total lifestyle, a decision to consciously yield control of our lives to Jesus Christ. And this my friends sometimes means pain and suffering.
Part of the problem with the Church today is we don’t tell people about this when we invite them to trust in Jesus Christ. We say, "Follow Jesus and your relationships will all get better, you’ll be happier, healthier, richer." Follow Jesus and all your dreams will come true, all your goals will become reality. Follow Jesus and your marriage will always be romantic and exciting and fulfilling, your kids will always turn out okay, and people will respect you. Some of those things might happen, but we have no right to promise those things.
Following Jesus means taking the road less traveled, a road that will have disappointment and pain along it. But of course, the paradox is that its on this road where we find what true life is all about. I was reading a book on the spiritual life All Things New by a writer named Henri Nouwen earlier this week, and he pointed this out. He said that our lives are filled to the brim with activities and things to do, our calendars are full, our schedules are tight. We’re busy and frantic, racing from place to place to urgency. We constantly worry, worrying about our kids, our jobs, our homes, our friends, our nation, our world. And this frenzy of activity and worry makes us feel very important, very in control of our lives.
But underneath it all is an emptiness, a void that a full calendar can’t fill, a void that new possessions can’t fill, a void that a new career can’t make go away. The mathematician Blaise Pascal called it a God shaped vacuum, and the theologian Augustine called it a restlessness in our souls. And the irony is that the fuller we stuff our lives with things to do and concerns to worry about, the more empty our lives feel when we’re alone. It’s only as we rid ourselves of these things, surrendering them at the foot of Christ’s cross that we find real life.The God shaped vacuum can only be filled by the Creator who placed it there.
Jesus’ words here would not have impressed any marketing consultants. But millions have heard the call of God in his words. In fact, today 35% of the world’s population follow this man who called himself the suffering Messiah. Hundreds of thousands have faced death in following him, even in our lifetimes.
Conclusion
Jesus isn’t who most people think he is. He’s not merely a prophet or an example, a teacher or an angel. To be a Christian means to confess Jesus as the Messiah, the kind of Messiah God promised he would send. And to follow Jesus is to take a path of suffering, a path many may not understand. But it’s a path that leads to real life. Are you following the right Jesus?
