Mark 8:22-9:1 You Are the Messiah

 

Who is Jesus? This is a question that even the disciples asked each other, especially after Jesus calmed a storm with just his words. They turned to each terrified, asking, “Who is this? Even the wind and waves obey him!” Jesus has been doing things, saying things that no one else had ever done before on the same scale as Jesus. Jesus has healed diseases, raised the dead, cast out demons, calmed storms, walked on water and fed thousands of people with just a few loaves of bread and some fish. Jesus is teaching with power and authority and people are listening and lives are being changed. Jesus’ disciples are trying to figure out just who Jesus is.

Marks leads us to the answer to the disciples’ question through the healing of a blind man. It’s a really different kind of healing for Jesus. Some people bring a blind man to Jesus and simply ask him to touch the blind man. They know that Jesus cares and has healed people by just touching them, or by the people touching Jesus. Jesus takes the blind man by the hand and leads him out of town. Then Jesus spits on the man’s eyes and touches him, asking, “Do you see anything?” We expect the man to tell Jesus, “Wow, I can see,” but the man’s answer is slightly different, “I see people; they look like trees walking around.” Didn’t see that coming! What went wrong? This miracle just went sideways on Jesus, or did it?

Jesus then puts his hands on the man’s eyes and Mark tells us, “Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.” Full sight restored, no more walking trees, mission accomplished, but why does it take two tries? Who does Mark tell this story, normally Mark tells us stories about Jesus that make us sit up and go “Wow!” Sometimes to understand one story in the Bible, you need to read the stories leading up to it and the stories that follow in order to see what the writer is getting at.

Mark has his reason for including this story of Jesus’ healing of the blind man here and we get more understanding and a “Wow” moment as we read on. “Jesus and his disciples went on to the villages around Caesarea Philippi. On the way he asked them, “Who do people say I am?” They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.” “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?” people aren’t quite sure who he is, there’s different answers, but everyone seems to agree that Jesus isn’t an ordinary person and it’s a good chance that he’s a powerful prophet like the old-time prophets Elijah, or maybe even John the Baptist, though that seems a stretch since it’s John who baptized Jesus.

Now Jesus asks them the question that has been on their mind ever since Jesus had calmed the storm, a question that has been sitting in their hearts as they’ve seen Jesus do miracle after miracle, as they’ve listened to him preach, “Who do you say I am?” Peter answers, “You are the Messiah.” This is a “Wow” moment; if Peter is right, then the Messiah Israel has been waiting for, for hundreds of years has finally arrived! Even though Mark already told us Jesus is the Messiah in the first sentence of his Gospel, this is the first time since then that Jesus is identified as the promised Messiah! The disciples get it, they see who Jesus is! Or do they?

This is where we step back for a moment to look again at the healing of the blind man. In the first stage of his healing, the blind man sees people, but they look like trees walking. He sees, but not clearly. It’s the same with Peter, he sees who Jesus is, but not clearly. We see Peter is partly blind to who Jesus is when he begins to rebuke Jesus for telling them that he’s going to suffer, be rejected, and killed, but then will rise up from the grave in three days. Jesus talks about the disciples having to deny themselves, to be willing to give their lives up for him, and take up crosses. Peter and the disciples are not expecting this kind of Messiah. They’re expecting an anointed king from the line of David to claim the throne in Jerusalem and throw out their oppressors. They’re looking for a national and political Messiah, but Jesus never did anything to lead them to think this way. He’s never challenged Rome or shown any interest in Herod’s throne.

Jesus’ intense teaching about suffering, death and crosses draws a rebuke from Peter, but Jesus’ response to Peter is even more intense, “Get behind me, Satan! You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” Ouch! Yet how often, when we think about church, when we look at our ministries and priorities, how often are our concerns more about us than about the concerns of God; do we even think about the concerns of God in our committee meetings, does the subject even come up? Do we ask ourselves, “How much does Jesus care about the people of our community? Do we care that much?” I believe we need to be honest with ourselves and admit that we all have places in our faith, in our lives where we fail to see who Jesus is clearly.

As Bethel Church, we talk about sharing our faith with others, yet how often are we sharing our faith? Is it because we don’t see what Jesus is already doing in their lives because we’re not looking, so we find it hard to share the Good News of who Jesus is? These are uncomfortable questions; we think we know who Jesus is, what he wants, we think he’s happy with how we live our lives, but are we more like Peter than we want to admit, that we’ve created a Messiah of our own creation instead of the Messiah who has come? I wear reading glasses now because otherwise the words on the page are blurry and I find it hard to understand what I’m seeing; the glasses make things clear. If you want to see Jesus clearly, read the Bible. Simply making reading the Bible daily a priority will deepen your faith and help you see who Jesus is more clearly.

Jesus now shares what a disciple of his looks like. “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels.”

How do Peter and the disciples hear this? Instead of fame, fortune and power, the disciples are being promised persecution, prisons, and crosses! They’re being called to give up their desires and dreams and to embrace Jesus’ ways, Jesus’ kingdom vision and plans, to put others first. The disciples did not clearly see the kind of Messiah Jesus really is. They, like us all too often, see Jesus through their own wants and desires instead of through God’s will and concerns for reconciliation and new life for his people and creation. The disciples’ Messiah is too small, Jesus wants so much more for us. Jesus wants us to have a rich full life he wants us to experience healing and strength, but that means choosing Jesus as our whole universe, as Ann Voskamp reminds us, recognizing Jesus as the Messiah who offers grace and brings new life. Do you want to grow, to become more? Denying yourself grows you. Allowing the Holy Spirit to guide you in giving yourself away to Jesus’ call to love God and your neighbour, to serve others and make disciples so they can flourish and find healing.

Jumping ahead a bit, at the end of chapter 10 we see Jesus healing Blind Bartimaeus. In the verses just before this healing, Jesus reveals exactly what kind of a Messiah he is, “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Jesus is the Messiah who comes to serve us by offering his life in place of ours on the cross, the place where he paid the ransom for our sin, freeing us from the punishment for our sin, bringing us hope that there is more, that there is healing and freedom. Jesus sends the Holy Spirit to guide us into becoming the people God has created us to be as we see his will and do it. We’re given the Holy Spirit to help us to be servants first, giving ourselves to God for his concerns, giving ourselves to bring the good news of Jesus the Messiah, helping others to see who Jesus is.