Lent 2 – “How to rebuke Jesus.” – Mark 8:31-38

Lent 2 – “How to rebuke Jesus.” – Mark 8:31-38
3/12/06 – St. Paul’s Lutheran, Union Grove – Vicar Matthew Peters

Grace, Mercy, and Peace to you from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Whenever a person of some importance, or in a high-profile position starts to get down on themselves, it’s usually the role of those who are closest to them to try to cheer them up. If a sports figure starts feeling defeated in a game, the coach or the other players have to get their mind back onto a positive way of thinking, and tell them to stop acting like they’ve already lost. If someone is at the peak of their performance, at work, in a game, or in life – and all of a sudden starts acting like its all going to go down the drain… you would expect their friends to pick up their spirits.
This is what Peter thought that he was doing in our gospel lesson for today, in Mark chapter 8:
He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that He must be killed and after three days rise again. He spoke plainly about this, and Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him.

Jesus was losing His nerve, at least that’s what Peter thought. It looked like He was suddenly giving up on this mission. Like He had decided that it was a losing battle – and that He wanted His followers to be ready when the end of their run finally came. And it isn’t hard to see why it sounded this way to Peter and the disciples. Jesus had predicted His death and resurrection before. But He’d used parables and prophetic language; if you knew what He was getting at it was fairly obvious. However, this was the first time that Jesus had spoken so clearly about what was going to happen to Him. The disciples hadn’t picked up on it the other times that Jesus had mentioned these things, and so He made Himself plain. And it looked like Jesus was ready to lose – to just give up and quit.

During the season of Lent, it’s easy to see Jesus in this same depressing light. This is the time of the year when we have to watch as ‘our guy’ gets it. It feels sick and wrong to just sit around and watch as Jesus gets beaten up and tortured, ridiculed and ultimately killed. And then we act as though it’s almost some sort of celebration! I mean, just consider our opening hymn this morning; ‘Come, Let us join our Cheerful Songs.’ I’ll freely admit that I chose that hymn, and for a good reason too. But how backwards does it seem for us to sing ‘cheerful songs’ about our Lord being killed?
It makes you want to walk up to Jesus, like Peter did, and say, “Hey, Jesus. It doesn’t have to be this way. We know how powerful you are. You can handle these guys! Don’t give up! Don’t act like the game is already over… we’re behind you all the way.”

And so we go along with Peter, take Jesus aside, and tell Him how we feel about all of these things. We tell Jesus that He’s wrong, what He’s been talking about is nonsense. It must be a case of nerves… We, along with Peter, would rebuke Jesus!
Maybe you’re thinking, “Now Vicar, I wouldn’t rebuke Jesus! I’d let Him say and do whatever He wants!” And maybe that’s true. But we also have the advantage of looking back and seeing things clearly… they call that 20/20 hindsight. But who of us would want to see our beloved Jesus – our teacher and friend – be rejected and die? We would probably want to rebuke Him just like Peter did because we don’t want to lose Him. We don’t want Jesus to have to go through that. We don’t want Jesus to look as though He’s been defeated…
Surely this can’t be right!

Well, as we heard in the gospel reading, Jesus has a quick response for Peter’s rebuke. And His response is more than a simple, “Stop it!” or “Cut that out!” Jesus says to Peter,
“Get behind me Satan!”
Ouch! Wow. Getting scolded by someone you care about and respect can be painful… but for the Son of God to refer to you as ‘Satan’, that would be pretty hard! It’s almost enough to make you feel sorry for Peter… almost.
Why such strong words of rebuke from Jesus? Why call Peter the name of the Devil?

This is because what Peter was asking Jesus to do was exactly the same as what the Devil had tempted Him to do in the desert. ‘Give it up’ – ‘Do this instead’ – ‘Be glorious.’ – ‘Look like a winner.’ Peter was asking Him to do something exactly opposite of His purpose – directly against God’s will.
“Get behind me Satan…You do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”
Peter wanted to be on the ‘winning’ team. He wasn’t ready to be proud of ‘his guy’ if He were going to just go off and die without a fight. Peter wanted what seemed best to him – for Jesus to be victorious in the eyes of mankind.

This is the prideful approach of the sinful world. This is what it looks like when people who are sinners attempt to know what’s best. We think that we know better than God! We try to save Jesus from the cross…
When it comes down to it, we are uncomfortable in dealing with the fact that God had to do such an ugly and painful thing because of us. The sinner in us wants to concentrate on the ‘happy teachings’ of Jesus – those great miracles – those times when He looked so good. You don’t want to think about the cross as a symbol of torture and of death, we don’t want to think of that crown of thorns as it drips with His sweat and His blood…

Lent is a troubling time… it demands that we focus on His pain. It demands that we focus on our faults, on our failings.
Take a moment and consider, as you look at the rugged-ness of this cross, [ref. cross in chancel] consider the shame and the agony of what Jesus was predicting He was to go through. …It isn’t supposed to sound good.

But to rebuke Jesus… to rebuke Jesus and say, ‘By no means!’ such as Simon Peter did… that would make it all the worse. To rebuke Jesus is to rebuke God! To rebuke God means that you are rejecting Him and what He is willing to undergo on our behalf.
Peter made this same mistake on the night of the Last Supper – Peter did not want Jesus to ceremonially wash his feet. But in order to be acceptable before God, we must allow for Jesus to serve us as He intends. We must be washed in His blood… we have to be forgiven by His death!

Although the disciples may have had some difficulty seeing it at the time, after things were accomplished, Jesus, and later the Holy Spirit, made it very clear to them. And in our Epistle lesson for today, Paul writes it very plainly to the church in Rome as to why Jesus died that terrible death that made it appear as though He was giving up and failing:
From Romans 5:6-9…
“You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by His blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through Him!”

You see, in rebuking Jesus, Peter was rejecting God’s love. In telling Jesus that He doesn’t need to die – we’re saying that we can handle things without His help.
But God’s love for us would not allow Jesus to be swayed. The Devil tempting Jesus in the wilderness, and His friend Peter rebuking Him in the presence of the other disciples – neither one of these could even begin to convince Jesus to do something other than what He had been sent to do. The cross, that ugly and painful cross, is God showing the world how much He loves us!

Again, this is why I chose to sing that hymn at the beginning of the service. ‘Come let us join our cheerful songs.’ It’s not a Lenten Hymn! But it does show us very clearly the end result of what this Lenten time is all about; it shows the throne-room of heaven, as John saw it in the book of Revelation; and everyone is singing praise to the ‘Lamb that died’. Though it might not make sense in the eyes of the world, our highest praise and adoration go to the one who hung upon a cross and looked as though He had been defeated!
Because as strange as it sounds, it is good news! Shrouded in sadness, this Lenten season is the happiest time of all creation, as the Lord prepares to bring salvation into the world.

Throughout the entire Bible, this is what God has been leading up to. He promised everyone along the way that His covenant would be fulfilled… He would send a Savior. God’s word gives us assurance that what Jesus was about to do was not merely some political statement, or misguided and failed attempt at power. The death of Jesus Christ upon the cross is the fulfilling and ultimate sacrifice to remove the guilt of the sins of the world!
And through faith in this Jesus… that gift of forgiveness, that removal of guilt, is yours!

And there’s more proof! In case you weren’t convinced, there is another piece of evidence that shows that Jesus was victorious – even if the cross looked like a defeat. This season of Lent does not end with Good Friday. We do not have to walk away from the church with a dead Jesus hanging on the cross! Because on the third day, on that first Easter Sunday, our Savior Jesus – the one who died on our behalf – rose again! He came back from the dead, because not even death could hold its own against Him. He proves that the sacrifice is complete; He proves that He has been victorious; and with that empty cross and that empty tomb, He proves that He has taken away all of your sins!

So who wants to rebuke Jesus now? You see, though we may mourn and we may lament all that we have done to put Jesus upon the cross. Though we may be saddened by the death of this one whom we love, and who loves us… We know that this is God’s way… this is how “the things of God” have been determined to work. That through the sufferings, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, all of your sins have been taken away.

Thanks be to God that He has so willingly borne this cross for us!
Amen.