Year B Proper 19 2018 The Cruxpoint of Mark

   

Year B Proper 19, 16 September 2018 

St. James the Less Episcopal, Ashland, Virginia 

“The Cruxpoint of Mark” 

  

Collect: O God, because without you we are not able to please you, mercifully grant that your Holy Spirit may in all things direct and rule our hearts; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. 

 Mark 8:27-38 Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” And they answered him, “John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.” He asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Messiah.” And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him.  Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”  He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.” 

 

My favorite movies are the ones with big reveals. I do. I just love them. I love being surprised. I love being shocked. I love when what you are looking at actually is something else entirely. I have a confession, if you did not know this already, but I am obsessed with movies. I own far too many. I could stock my own rental store. I even love bad movies, sometimes just for how bad they are. 

 

But as I started, when I am surprised or taken off guard, those are the ones that are my favorites. The Usual Suspects, The Sixth Sense, or Split more recently, had me delighted. It does not have to be horror or suspense even. Ocean’s Eleven and even You’ve Got Mail are far from scary, but are about missing what is right in front of your face. 

 

We do not think about the Gospel of Mark this way, but this is another example of a slow reveal. Now the people hearing Mark when it was first being read to them and to us who are hearing it now, WE ALREADY KNOW THE REST OF THE STORY. The first verse in Mark gives it away: “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” He says what he thinks about Jesus, and if you are hearing it you probably already think of Jesus as the Messiah, or Christ. Messiah is the Hebrew version of Christ, and Christ is the Greek version of Messiah. They mean “anointed one.” Now the way we know that we are in a slow reveal here is that in Mark the term Christ is mentioned in the first verse, 1:1, and the next time is when it comes out of Peter’s mouth as Messiah in what is called his “confession.”  

 

A couple of interesting points: Peter’s confession is one of four stories which are included in all four Gospels, not counting Holy Week/the Crucifixion. The other interesting point, that this is the turning point, the “hinge” if you will, in the Gospel of Mark. Everything before this in Mark is to point to the fact that Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ. But it is not named. You can hear the question floating around as he teaches and preaches, gathering crowds to him. “Could he be the One? Could he really?” As I said, we read it tending to already know the answer to the question. 

 

So Jesus is walking with his disciples one day, and like many a leader asks, “What are y’all hearing on the street? What are people saying about me?” We all need to be about market research. For good or bad, it is part of doing anything important. The biblical phrasing is this: “Who do people say that I am?” And they answered him, “John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.” Now none of these answers are lightweight, and they are pretty packed in and of themselves.  

 

John the Baptist had just been killed by Herod. If Jesus was John the Baptizer he would be a miraculous and threatening incarnation of the vengeance of God. Herod would be doomed by this one he had killed by his wife’s pride, and his daughter’s ignorance in her request.  

 

Elijah is no less important. Elijah who was taken up into heaven is supposed to be the precursor of the Messiah. If you go to a Passover Seder to this day, a chair is saved for Elijah and a glass of wine is poured  in case he shows up to announce the way of the Lord, that the Messiah has arrived. Part of the ritual is even to check the door and see if he is out there. (https://www.britannica.com/topic/Elijahs-cup) So if Jesus was Elijah, doing these acts of power, he was the one who would precede the one who came to take back the political throne of David, kicking the Romans out at last. Jesus was not John the Baptizer, and neither was he Elijah.

 

Nor was he a prophet, and remember, after the height of David and Solomon, MOST of our Scriptures that we have recorded in what we call the Old Testament are devoted to the prophets, the raging men of God who call Israel and Judah back into covenant, back into right relationship with God and right actions toward others, especially the Least of These, widows, orphans, strangers in our midst.  

 

Any of these answers are AWESOME, and point to the power and might of God. But then he shifts it. And Jesus asks the other question. “Who do you say that I am?” Now the Greek here lends itself to Virginia preachers, the you here is plural, so it really is “Who do y’all say that I am?”  

 

And here is the crux. One of the twelve, the loud and bombastic leader Peter, jumps up and gives the Sunday School answer. Peter answered him, “You are the Messiah.” And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him. The other Gospels tell this slightly differently. But here in Mark we get the first of a repeated motif, DO NOT TELL ANYONE! It is called the Mark’s Messianic Secret. There could be many a reason for this, like Jesus’ time had not yet come, or people need to come to this conclusion for themselves. 

 

Do notice that he did not deny what Peter said, nor did he reject it. He said to keep it secret, though we do not know why.  

 

Now the part of the story that breaks my heart, but also points me to the idea that the Gospels are true and real. As soon as we get the cruxpoint, Peter’s confession, he is also the very one who then decides to tell Jesus how to do his job.  

 

Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” 

 

No, no, no Peter says. It is not becoming for the Messiah to suffer. You will be the Triumphant King! You will be the Redemptive Patriot that will return the Throne of David and kick out these blankity-blank Romans. But as usual with the Disciples, these are Adventures in Missing the Point. Jesus, even in his rebuke, is pointing to what is the Point. This world, and its ways, are not what he came for. He is aiming his sights, and in doing so invites us to do the same, he is aiming his sights on the Divine.  

 

There is no point in “fixing the problem” on the level in which the problem was made. Jesus takes us to a higher level. And thankfully, he does not just deliver the rebuke but instructs on how to truly show him to be OUR Messiah, OUR Christ. Notice that all the readings today surround themselves on the what it means to be a Good Teacher. And Jesus delivers. 

 

He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? 

 

When we set ourselves on the Human Things, not the Divine Things, we get caught up in gaining the world. And as Jesus says, paraphrased, What is the point of gaining it all, and then in the end missing what is most important.  

 

We get Jesus cutting to the chase now. You see, in Mark’s Gospel anyway, we are now heading to Jerusalem. Jesus is on his way to the final scene. The tone has shifted, we no longer are asking “Could he be?” We are now hearing him openly saying HOW HE IS, and it is not on our terms. Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. He said all this quite openly. 

 

Think of sitting at a family dinner and granpa or granma starts talking about death. It is awkward. It is uncomfortable. (Shouldn’t be, but in our culture it is.) So we try to shush them, “Oh, you are going to be with us a good, long time.” Peter did pretty much the same thing. Jesus is talking openly, and his disciples do not like what they are hearing. They want to joy of triumph without the costs of the victory. They want Palm Sunday to be the end of the week, not Good Friday. Are we any different? 

 

The other type of movie that I really like, are the ones where a director makes a brave choice. Sometimes, they show you exactly where the story will go, should go, but then leave it open ended. It is up to us as to how the story will end. Castaway or The Natural comes to mind. You may not be shown the ending, but the director who has been guiding you makes it clear what the outcome will be. Mark does that as well. In the gospels we see the Resurrected Jesus, except in the Shorter Ending of Mark, what most scholars see as the original ending of Mark. We see an empty tomb, and we have to decide what we are going to do with that. Now Jesus tells us today, and repeats it throughout Mark that he will suffer, die, and rise again. It is up to us what the Empty Tomb means; it is up to us how the story continues.  

 

Each and every day, we have a choice, will we take up our cross, deny ourselves, and follow him? The question remains. And so does our response. Amen.