ON THE WAY
George Butterfield
September 21, 1997
A. Children's Ministry- mention that their very first newsletter is available.
B. Home Groups- off to a great start with a total of 241 in the various groups, counting His Needs Her Needs and the class here at the building. We need people who will receive the training necessary to lead a group. If you are interested, please let me know, let Tom Blucker or Craig Lawson know, or call the church office.
C. Mark 9:30-37.
1. The overall theme of vv. 30-50 is "What does it mean to follow Jesus?" This morning we will consider part of this text and next week the rest.
2. These verses are part of Mark 8:27-10:45 which is dominated by three predictions of our Lord's passion.
a. Read 8:31-33; 10:32-45.
(1) In the first text the response is a rebuke by Peter.
(2) In the latter or third text the response is a request for a seat of preeminence in the kingdom, anger on the part of the other disciples, and Jesus' statement about service, greatness and the purpose of his ministry, to be a servant and give his life as a ransom for all.
b. At each of these three points in his Gospel Mark has the same threefold cluster of material.
(1) First, Jesus predicts his suffering, rejection, death, and resurrection.
(2) Second, the disciples respond with misunderstanding, confusion, and an inability to accept his message.
(3) Third, Jesus gives instruction on discipleship.
3. Today we consider the middle of these three texts.
I. Jesus' Prediction of His Passion and the Disciples' Response.
A. Vv. 30-31a- Jesus cares for the crowds. But teaching his own disciples was a greater priority.
B. V. 31b (the prediction)-
1. Notice that the primary attention is given to the suffering and death of Jesus and not the resurrection. And this is true of all three of these predictions. The resurrection is stated but the accent is clearly not there.
a. Many of us have grown up with, perhaps, less emphasis on the resurrection than there should have been. For example, the Lord's Supper was a meditation upon a dead man with attending funeral music. The sense of celebration and joy at Christ's victory over death needed to be recovered. And we do well to worship God with the confession on our lips that "He is risen! He is risen indeed!"
b. But the emphasis, the climax, of Mark's Gospel, is the cross and its attending abuses and humiliation.
(1) By this attention to the cross, Mark is not only defining the nature of Jesus' messiahship but also describing the terms of following Jesus "on the way."
(2) When we ask, "What does it mean to follow Jesus on the way of our lives," Jesus talks to us about humiliation, suffering and death.
(a) We do well not to hurry to jump over the cross to the empty tomb.
(b) I was recently reading On the Incarnation by Athanasius, the Bishop of Alexandria in the 4th century. He asks the question, Why did Jesus stay in the tomb for 3 days? One of his reasons is so that people would know he was really dead.
(c) I can just see a rewritten version of the passion by many Christians today. Instead of days of suffering and humiliation followed by 3 days in the tomb, Jesus is shot to death, pronounced dead by all who are nearby, followed by Jesus jumping up and saying "Hey, hey, hey - I'm alive!"
(c1) I can see it all now: people wearing little 9 milimeters on a gold chain around their neck or little silver bullets!
(c2) The cross was not just a killing instrument. There were other ways to kill people that were faster and more economical. But the cross was an occasion for humiliation and suffering. In the first prediction Jesus begins by saying that "the Son of Man must undergo great suffering" (8:31). The third prediction is even more graphic. Jesus says that he will be handed over to the Gentiles and "they will mock him, and spit upon him, and flog him, and kill him" (10:34). The killing doesn't even seem to be his main emphasis.
2. Notice two other interesting things about the prediction:
a. "into human hands"- In addition to his rejection by Jewish leaders (8:31; 10:33), Jesus must suffer at the hands of representatives of the whole human race.
(1) Isn't it ironic, that all humankind is implicated in the death of the one who came to die for all?
(2) It's somewhat politically incorrect today to claim that the Jews had Jesus crucified. We need to let those poor, persecuted Jews off the hook.
(a) If these texts become a pretext for anti-Semitism, then I agree.
(b) But this text lets no one off the hook. That includes the Jew, the Gentile, the people, the Roman officials and soldiers, all who stand before God with "human hands."
(3) And that includes you and me. The song "Were You There?" asks some rhetorical questions.
(a) "Were you there when they crucified my Lord?" We know that the intent of the song is for each of us to answer, "Yes."
(b) But we do well not to let ourselves off the hook by singing it, "Were you there when they crucified my Lord." Jesus was delivered "into human hands." Everyone here today with "human hands" is implicated in our Lord's death. Everyone!
b. "betrayed" or, better, "delivered up."
(1) This term is commonly used in Jewish literature to describe the fate of the prophets, is used in Mark to speak of the fate of John the Baptist, and also of the crime of Judas Iscariot.
(2) Early Christians understood the term delivered up not only as an expression of the divine necessity of Jesus' death but also of their own inevitable experience in the service of the gospel.
C. V. 32-
1. The response of the Twelve is stated as one of misunderstanding and fear.
2. But their problem is deeper, for when Jesus was teaching them about his approaching death, they were involved in a discussion on who was the greatest. Their obsession with position and power rendered them incapable of comprehending, much less of accepting, Jesus' word about himself. Understanding is a matter not only of intelligence but also of character.
3. Let us turn now to the disciples and Jesus' instruction to them on this matter.
II. Jesus' Instruction to His Disciples.
A. Vv. 33-34-
1. "the house"- "presumably Peter's house is meant (cf. 1:29). (Mann, 376).
2. "arguing about"- The word implies private remarks or asides not intended to be overheard. The disciples are struck dumb with embarrassment, for they recognize the discrepancy between Jesus' denial of self and their own desire for self-aggrandizement as they argue about who is the greatest.
3. "on the way"- repeated in v. 34. "This phrase in Mark refers to the way of Jesus, culminating in the cross, and to the path of discipleship defined by Jesus' own life of service and death.
a. Isn't it interesting that Jesus and the disciples were "on the way" together but interpreted that "way" so differently?
(1) The "way" of Jesus is humiliation, suffering and death.
(2) The "way" of the disciples is sitting at the right and left hand of Jesus in the kingdom. Glory!
b. Think of what this group must have looked like to an outsider who saw them come through town: looks like one big group all going in the same direction. But the disciples seem not to have a clue where that "way" will lead.
c. And is the church any different today? We've all gathered here together. But what "way" are you taking? What "way" am I taking? Sometimes our interests are so different that it makes you wonder whether or not we're all on the same way.
B. V. 35-
1. "sat down"- indicates formal teaching.
2. "called the twelve"- focuses the teaching upon leaders among the disciples.
3. "first/last/servant of all"- Jesus measures greatness not by success but by service. He identifies with the child who is not powerful but vulnerable.
C. Vv. 36-7-
1. "a little child"-
a. Mark's readers would readily have seen in Jesus' embrace of the child his self-identification with the lowliest, the least, and the servants of all.
b. The child is the classic image of the powerless, those without claim and without capacity to reward or repay.
2. So, what is Jesus' point in v. 37?
a. One writer says, "To take the least and last of God's people into our arms is to be incarnationally identified with Jesus and through Him with God the Father." It's as if I become like Jesus when I welcome the lowly.
b. But Jesus goes further than this. Since he so identifies with the lowliest of the low, to welcome them is to welcome him. And to welcome him is to welcome the one who sent him.
(1) Where do you think Mother Teresa got her theology that when you welcome the poorest of the poor you welcome Jesus? Here it is.
(2) We will talk more next week about how we treat "the little ones." But for now it is enough for us to know that being "on the way" with Jesus not only includes what others will do to you through suffering, humiliation and death. It is also the "way" that we choose if we would identify with the Son of Man and the one who sent him.
Conclusion
A. In the Acts of the Apostles one of Luke's descriptions of the early church is "The Way." These are people who are "on the way." They are on a journey. And what do they encounter on that journey, on that "way"? They encounter the same thing Jesus encountered on the way.
B. But there are some, even among the disciples, who do not understand the way of Jesus.
1. They argue about greatness.
2. They argue about position and power.
3. Sometimes they just argue to hear themselves argue.
4. They seem to think that this is Burger King: "they want it their way"!
5. Are you prepared to stand before Jesus and give an answer to, "What were you arguing about on the way?"
6. You can tell a lot about a Christian and about a church by what they think is important enough to argue about.
C. Frankly, those who are "on the way" of Jesus have better things to do.
1. There are the lowly, the poor, to serve.
2. There are the weak to be encouraged.
3. There are children to be lifted up.
4. To be on this "way" is to identify with Jesus, welcome him and welcome the one who sent him.
D. What about you, my brothers and sisters? What is your way?