Jesus Has No Chill
Sunday March 17, 2024
Series: Mark Part 2 - Week 5 March 17, 2024 Scripture: Mk 8:31-33, Daniel 7:13-14 (NIV11)
Community is shaped by the conversations we share. These questions are just a tool to help you meaningfully engage with the themes of this week's teaching.
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Message Summary: This week, Jeremy talks about the reaction of the disciples toward Jesus’ self-disclosure and predictions of his own death, and how Jesus correct their misconceptions about the Messiah and encourages us to let go of our ideas and ideologies that prevent us from following the way of Jesus.
Hard Right Turn. In ch.8, it is Peter who uses the title Messiah for Jesus, and it is Peter who then pulls Jesus aside to rebuke him, when Jesus starts talking about his impending suffering and death. Jesus gave his disciples a lot of space to come to their own conclusions and it looks like they are finally getting it, but in this moment it all feels like it is tumbling down.
Self-disclosure. The dynamic of this interaction is understandable. Peter waited for a long time to say that Jesus is the Messiah and it is a moment of celebration for him, but now Jesus’ talk of death and suffering feels like raining on his own parade. And for Jesus, who waited for a long time for his friends to understand him, this moment of vulnerability and self-disclosure feels like being shut down with, “oh don’t be so negative.”
The Son of Man. Mark’s preferred name for Jesus is not the Messiah, but the son of man. It comes from Aramaic and it was used by the prophet Daniel, overtime it became a term of modesty used to identify with common people. Chad Meyers suggests a better translation - “the human one.” And that clarifies for us the reason for Peter’s objection. It was absolutely conceivable that the son of man might die, but it was inconceivable that the Messiah could be just the son of man. Jesus accepts the title of the Messiah but then immediately begins to qualify it. In Daniel 7:13-14, we see there was a latent imagination of a human one, but over time, people started downplaying the earthiness of the son of man and Jesus wants to bring his disciples back to this idea. The son of man can forgive sins, but can also suffer and be hurt and killed. Jesus wants them to understand that the kingdom of God needs to birthed within. But the disciples, like many of us today, tend to invert the story and project their own messianic expectations, as if we want God’s will to be imposed on us.
The Problem with Satan. Jesus’ strong reaction and Peter’s inability to understand show us how complex this moment was for them. Today, for instance, we often take Isaiah 53, “the suffering servant song”, to talk about Jesus and we might be surprised why Peter didn’t see that Jesus was supposed to suffer and die, but it is our interpretation and reinterpretation of the Isaiah text in light of what we know today. For those who lived in the time of Isaiah it was never about Jesus, it was about the suffering nation. The word Jesus uses for “satan” means adversary. He doesn’t see Peter as his adversary, Peter is his friend and he is already safely behind Jesus, when Jesus turns to the disciples to say “Get behind me, Satan.” What Jesus wants to be out of his way is a triumphalist imagination of the Messiah that is opposed to the lowly way of peace and grace.
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Connect: We are in the fifth week of Lent, take some time to briefly share how these last few weeks felt for you. What made you feel scattered or focused, peaceful or frazzled, present to the season of Lent or distant from it?
Share: What connects with you in Peter's response to Jesus's predictions of His suffering? How does Jesus’ response to Peter make you feel? How does this whole interaction between Jesus and Peter challenge you or maybe your own perception of what it means to follow God or resist God’s ways?
Reflect: What do you think about the tension between the titles "Son of Man" and “Messiah”? How does seeing Jesus prefer the word that was used to identify with common people to describe himself inform your understanding of Jesus? Why do you think Mark went mostly with this title for Jesus and reserved “Messiah” only for big moments? Why do you think it was so challenging for Peter to hold the two titles and expressions of the divine together? What is challenging about it for you?
Engage: How did Jeremy re-frame the understanding of “get behind me, Satan” in this sermon for you? How did you use to interpret that conversation between Peter and Jesus? And how seeing “ha satan” not as a personified devil but as a triumphalist ideology of the Messiah floating in the popular imagination clarify this text for you? Would you agree with this take on the text? How does this quote from the sermon resonate with you today? “There are ideas and ideologies, aspirations that all of us need to learn to leave behind in order to follow the way of Jesus. But Jesus will never confuse you with the unhelpful ideas you carry, with the mistake that you make, or with the times that you fall. Because those are not you any more than Peter was his misconceptions of Jesus. And the goodness of God is the grace that comes to find us in bad stories to invite us toward a better one.”
Take away: What would you like to take away from today’s conversation?
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Prayer from the sermon: Our patient God, Who creates space for us, Who guards that space for us, Who walks sometimes ahead and sometimes silently beside, But always near us on the path toward wholeness, Might we sense your presence with us today. And if we have felt particularly alone of late, Would your loving Spirit remind us of your commitment to us, Your gentle nearness that somehow brings both comfort And the space to find our own way. And if, on the other hand, we know that presence today, If that care and kindness is familiar to us in this moment, then we offer our thank And we commit ourselves to becoming that same gentle love For those near us. Guide us slowly steadily always back to the heart of God. In the strong name of the risen Christ we pray, Amen.
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Call to Worship: Psalm 111
Music: Curated by Curt Muller
Citizens - Good Ground
Mission House - Whole Heart
Commons Worship - Faithfully
Hillsong Worship - Who You Say I AmSt Patrick’s Day Prayer: Written by Bobbi Salkeld
Today is Saint Patrick’s day, and like many dates in the church calendar that commemorate a saint – Saint Patrick’s Day is full of legend. Patrick was not in fact Irish, but British under Roman rule near the end of the empire. He went back and forth to Ireland, having first been taken as a slave and then returning as a missionary.
Saint Patrick looms large in what we now call Celtic Christianity – along with Saint Brigid of Kildare and Saint Columba. Celtic Christianity is an expression of Christianity that stays close to nature, tracks with the cycles of the seasons, and isn’t too concerned with hierarchy.
Please join me in this adaptation of what is called “Saint Patrick’s Breastplate” – it’s a prayer that comes to us from Celtic Christianity if not quite from Patrick himself.
Let us pray.
We bind to ourselves today the story of Christ forever – His incarnation, His baptism in the Jordan river, His death on the cross, His life from the tomb.
We bind to ourselves today The power of God to hold and lead,God’s eye to watch, God’s might to stay. The wisdom of God to teach, God’s hand to guide, God’s word to speak.
We bind to ourselves today. The power of heaven, The light of the sun, The force of fire, The flashing of lightning, The depth of the sea,The stability of the earth.
Christ with us, Christ within us. Christ behind us, Christ before us. Christ to comfort and restore us, Christ in quiet, Christ in danger, Christ in hearts of all that love me. Christ in mouths of friend and stranger.
May the beauty of God’s work to save us Be with us all. Amen.
Adapted from 2000 Years of Prayer, compiled by Michael Counsell and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Patrick%27s_Breastplate
