35. Mark 8:31-9:1
Satan?
(8:31-33)
As we turn to the “Two Ways” section of
Mark on the nuts and bolts of following Jesus on the way to Jerusalem, Jesus “sternly
orders” (8:30) the disciples not to say anything to anybody about him, you
know, the messiah business. Now we find out why.
Using his favorite self-designation,
the under-defined “Son of Man” (from Dan.7) he fills out Peter’s confession
with his own content. He’s already loaded it with his challenging of the debt
system and challenging the traditional understanding of the sabbath (ch.2) Now
he adds, “I’m going to suffer, be rejected by the powers that be, get killed,
and rise from the dead after three days.”
Doubtless the
disciples all shook their heads as if they understood, mentally filing this saying
with all the other strange and unintelligible things Jesus had said to them. Except
for Peter. He took Jesus off to the side, surely to spare him the embarrassment
of a public rebuke and himself the embarrassment of Jesus having just proven
him wrong. A rebuke seems certainly in order.
This is just too
much, Peter blurts out. No messiah can talk like that! Much less believe it! You’ve
gotta take all that back – it’s bringing the guys down!”
Peter, and the
disciples for whom he speaks, need a “second” touch. They do not see clearly
yet – far from it! And until after the resurrection they will not. None of us
do. But it is still instructive for us
to observe the ways the disciples misunderstand Jesus. For we will too. Even after
the resurrection.
Jesus is the kind of
messiah who fulfills God’s plans by undergoing suffering, rejection, and death
He trusts God with himself and his mission so much that he believes even death
is not the end of his story, Israel’s story. “He said all this quite openly”
(v.32). The disciples did not mishear or find his speech garbled. They simply
wouldn’t or couldn’t understand.
Jesus pulls no
punches nor sugar-coats what’s at stake here. “Satan,” he calls it. Opposed to
God. Hostile to God. Subversive of God. Common sense, realpolitik, peace
through strength. These are “human things,” not “divine things.”
Thus ends Jesus’
first announcement of his death and resurrection!
Ultimately the
Satanic strategy is to get ahead of Jesus, alongside Jesus, to his left or his
right, any place but “behind” hm. That’s the proper place of the disciple, a “follower,”
someone who stays “behind” Jesus. This is the hope Jesus offers to Peter and
the rest of disciples, yesterday and today.
Cross-Bearing (8:34-9:1)
And that hope, counterintuitively enough, leads right to a cross. Hurtado
reminds us of what this meant in the 1st century.
“When Mark’s first readers read these words, they could have understood them only as a warning that discipleship
might mean execution, for in their time the cross was a
well-known instrument of Roman execution used on runaway slaves,
rebels, and other criminals of lower classes . . . To be more precise,
in Mark’s time the cross was not just an indication of possible
death for disciples, it was a warning of execution by the state authorities. Thus, in the same way that Jesus’ ministry led
him to a collision with both Jewish and Roman authorities, the disciples (and
readers) are warned to be prepared for the same sort of trouble. This is
made all the clearer by Jesus’ warning about trying to save one’s life by denying him. The situation envisioned in 8:35 is that of
a trial in which one is commanded
to renounce Jesus to live. Mark alone has the phrase and for the
gospel,
which shows that the saying is to be applied
to the situation of the
early church and its mission of preaching the gospel in spite of hostility and
persecution . . .”[1]
Notice that Jesus draws the crowds in with the disciples
to hear his announcement of cross-bearing. Their “Satanic” posture has placed
them in the same place as the crowds as far as grasping the upside-down
counter-intuitive character of his kingdom. They too must be re-evangelized. How
about us?
The cross, as we just say, is the political, social, and economic
cost of discipleship. The cross is not a chronic illness, a crappy boss, an
incorrigible teenager, or any other of the “slings and arrows of outrageous
fortune” that come our way. Those are the price of living, it seems. We must
choose the cross of Jesus as our way through the world. And accept the dangers,
disruptions, and difficulties incumbent with publically identifying ourselves
with it.
Jesus advances his re-evangelization message with three
claims:
-To
choose natural survival instead of Jesus’ cross is flawed instinct.
-To
invest in the stuff and security of this world is a bad investment.
-To be
ashamed to stand for Jesus and his gospel in way that makes one distinctive in
the world will cost one Jesus’ acknowledgment at his return.
As evidence that some at least of the crowds/disciples
hear enough to respond in faith and trust Mark leaves us with this: “Truly
I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they
see that the kingdom of God has come with power.” This sounds straightforward
enough: some of those there that day will be alive when the kingdom of God is present
in power.
We
know a bit about the Kingdom of God as we have met it in Mark so far. Jesus is
the agent and content of this kingdom. He has a unique authority in both word
and deed. He is all about the reconciliation and restoration of God’s people to
be the Abrahamic people God promised they would be. This kingdom works
unobtrusively around the edges and at the margins. It starts small and somehow,
someway, ends up hosting all the nations of the world. It defeats all other
powers though without violence. It comes neither in the way of Jewish religious
leadership nor Herodian political machinations.
What
would it mean, then, for this kingdom to be present in power such that some
standing with Jesus that day would “see” it? The Transfiguration story which
Mark presents next seems to fill the bill. It momentarily reveals Jesus in his
full glory to three of the disciples there that day. But they do not yet truly “see”
Jesus even in the Transfiguration story itself they seem to remain befuddled.
Yet,
the transfiguration story is likely part of the answer to what Jesus means. The
revelation on the mountain points itself to the meaning of Jesus on the cross.
That’s where we see what Jesus’ transfiguration is all about. And since we’ve
also got the “Son of Man” coming in glory here, it seems seeing the kingdom in
power in that generation means seeing Jesus as Lord by virtue of his resurrection,
especially for Mark’s readers some of whom will “see” that victory played out
in the defeat of Israel in the futile war against Rome which is at the
threshold for them.
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