The Cross in 4 Words: Mission

Introduction

Christ Is Risen! …He is Risen Indeed!

Yes! I love this tradition because I know that these very words are being declared and responded to among gatherings of God’s people all around the World. Christians are gathering together today in Ornate stone cathedrals, borrowed movie theatres, backwoods Country pews and on mats under banana trees and in their own language and their own way they are declaring

“Christ is Risen!”... He is Risen Indeed

They do this and we do this because this is the day that we celebrate when Jesus Christ rose from the dead. On Friday afternoon he breathed his last breath and then three days later, on Sunday Morning the women went to the Tomb early in the morning to find it empty and the stone rolled away.

And since the meaning of this was unclear to them at first, the LORD sent one of his messengers to explain.

Matthew 28:5–6a (ESV)

But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen, as he said.

Did you hear that? The Angel said, “Christ is Risen!” …He is Risen Indeed!

Yes He is… but did you notice how the Angel identified Jesus? We don’t know a lot of people named Jesus, but it was a common name back then. So the angel said… you seek Jesus who was crucified.

The Angel identified Jesus by the cross.

Orientation

And if you have been here over the past couple of weeks then you know that we have been digging deep into why the Christian Church operates under the banner of the cross. I mean, why not the empty grave? Wouldn’t that be an appropriate icon? “What is the deal with the cross”.

Well this Resurrection Sunday we are going to finish our series that we have entitled “The Cross in 4 Words”. So far we have looked at 3 of these words, each one connected to an Old Testament symbol that points to the work of the cross.

Freedom of the Cross

The first week we saw how the symbol of the Passover Lamb pointed God’s people to the FREEDOM of the Cross. God commanded the Israelites to, in faith, cover the planks of their doorposts with the blood of the lamb so that the angel of death would “Pass-over” them and free them from the judgement of death and subsequently their slavery in Egypt.

This was a foreshadowing of how placing our faith in the blood of Jesus that flowed down the planks of the cross would save us from death and free us from our slavery to sin.

1 Corinthians 5:7 (ESV) For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.

Forgiveness of the Cross

Then the next week we looked at the symbol of the two goats from the Day of Atonement, otherwise known as Yom Kippur. One goat, like the Passover Lamb, received the death sentence and the other banishment with the sins of the people placed on it’s head. This was the way that God made for his people to be Forgiven of their sins and so be able to be in his Holy Presence.

This too was a foreshadowing of how Jesus would one day receive our death sentence and he would bear our sin and rejection so that we can be forgiven of our sins and forever dwell in the presence of our Holy God.

Hebrews 9:22 (ESV)

... and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.

Justice of the Cross

And then this past Friday evening we looked deeply at the example of the Suffering Servant in Isaiah 53. This brought us to consider the Justice of the Cross.

700 years before Jesus walked the earth, Isaiah was given this Messianic prophecy that incorporated our other symbols of the sacrificial sheep and the bearing of our sins. The many prophetic references of how Jesus died gives no room to think that Jesus was somehow a victim of Roman Cruelty or Jewish Jealousy.

God the Father sent his Son to suffer and die on the cross for our sins. He did this because it was the only to satisfy the Just requirements of his own divine law. The cross had not even been invented yet when Isaiah wrote...

Isaiah 53:5 (ESV)

But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.

Tension

Notice that in all of these things we haven’t said anything about the resurrection. We looked at how these things...Freedom, Forgiveness and Justice...were accomplished for us by the work of Jesus on the cross... so what does that mean for the resurrection? What is the resurrection all about, if these things were actually accomplished by the cross?

The resurrection proves that the cross worked! That fact that “Christ Is Risen”…He is risen indeed”

The resurrection confirms that the suffering and death of Jesus on the cross did in fact accomplish all these things for us. Without the resurrection then we would have no assurances that these things were even accomplished.

The Apostle Paul addressed this very question back in...

1 Corinthians 15:17–20 (ESV)

And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.

You see we still live here, in this broken down version of God’s good creation and if this is all that their is then our freedom, forgiveness and justification would be temporary experiences at best. Because we are still gonna die someday. Or “fall asleep” as Paul says.

But because Jesus rose from the dead, we know that death is not the end for us. That Jesus’ suffering and death on the cross did in fact conquer sin, the devil and death and so those who are “in Christ” will one day raise from the dead to be with God for all of eternity in the unbroken, perfectly holy and unimaginably awesome life that we were always meant to live in.

The resurrection of Jesus proves the cross worked and so we too will be resurrected to new life in Christ Jesus and live for eternity with Him. Is that Good News Church? Amen?

…but what are we to do in the mean time?

That is the fourth and final world in our “The Cross in Four Words” series, . Having already learned of the Freedom of the cross, the Forgiveness of the Cross and the Justice of the cross, today we are going to look at our

Mission as shaped by the cross

To do this we will primarily be in Mark chapter 8, you can turn there in your Bibles or find it on page 844 in the Bibles in the chairs. I will stop here and pray and we will dive into this together.

Truth

We will quickly get to Mark 8, but to understand how our Mission is shaped by the cross we have to go back to the mission that Jesus left us with right before he ascended into heaven. This is found at the end of Matthew chapter 28, you can turn there if you want or the words will be on the screen.

At this point, the now resurrected Jesus has shown himself to hundreds of people to prove that the cross worked. Even showing his nail pierced hands to some to convince them that He had indeed suffered and conquered sin and death by the cross.

Matthew 28:16–20 (ESV)

Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted.

What an accurate picture of the people of faith.

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

This is the basis or foundation for this next big statement...

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.

And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

This is how Matthew ends his Gospel believing that everything that will happen from here on out will flow out of these words of Jesus. And in case you don’t recognize these words, this is what the Christian Church commonly calls “The Great Commission”.

This is the mission that Jesus wants us to co-operate with him on. It’s a “co-mission” we are doing it together with Jesus… And behold I am with you always to the end of the age!

And of the many things that Jesus says here, there is actually just one over arching command. It’s harder to see in English, but in Greek there is only one imperative or command here and that is to “Make Disciples”.

Make Disciples is the command and the “going”, the “baptizing”, the “teaching”, are all participles or verb like words that describe how we are to do that one command. So they are important and essential aspects of the larger command: To make Disciples.

So with the “co-mission” of “Making Disciples” in mind, now lets turn to Mark chapter 8 to see what Jesus earlier taught his disciples about what being his disciple is all about.

Mark 8 picks up about halfway through the Gospel of Mark and at this point Jesus’ disciples have been following him for a little while but they have yet to realize who He truly is. So Jesus asks them. “Who do you say that I am?”

And Peter steps up with the right answer. He says “You are the Christ.” which means the long awaited Messiah, the anointed one of God. And now that they know that Jesus is the anointed one, Jesus starts to teach them what He is there to do. He gives them the plan for what is about to happen.

Mark 8:31–32a (ESV)

And he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again. And he said this plainly.

Jesus spoke plainly, he was not “beating-around-the-bush” here. There was no mystery in these words, He was giving them the clear plan of the cross and all the suffering, rejection and humiliation that he knew would go with it.

He was saying it so directly that even a hard-headed blue collar fisherman could understand what he meant. And one did, and he didn’t like what he heard.

Mark 8:32 (ESV) And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.

Peter had just finished making the good confession that Jesus was the Christ, but when Jesus starts explaining what that means, Peter was like “no way, that is not how this is going to go down, this will never happen to you”.

Because Peter didn’t knowing sign up to be a disciple of a suffering and rejected Christ. He had more of a successful celebrity, celebrated leader, a military champion in mind and none of that was in the picture Jesus was painting. So Peter quietly takes Jesus aside, away from even the other disciples and says, no…we don’t need to do that way.

For the record, when Jesus gives you a plan, it is never a good idea to tell him “no”.

Mark 8:33–38 (ESV)

But turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”

Jesus recognizes Peters rebuke for what it was. Not a concern for Jesus’ personal welfare, but a temptation from the enemy to look for a safer, easier more socially acceptable route. But that was not God’s plan, because that would not get the job done.

Then Jesus takes it up another notch...

And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them,... so this is a public declaration now, not just about Peter, not just about the 12 but to the crowd as well (again) ...he said to them“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

Jesus “plainly” corrects Peter view on what being one of his followers looks like and I dare to say it might be a correction to many of our views as well.

Jesus doesn’t say invite us to follow Him so we can “Comfort ourselves with his love” or “Improve ourselves with his power” but instead he says that following Him means to “Deny ourselves for his purpose.”

“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

Three commands. Three imperatives: This is the Mission that is shaped by the cross. First that we would “deny ourselves” or...

Be ready to serve like Jesus (deny yourself)

To deny yourself in this way means to lay aside your wants and at times even your needs in service to another, especially if that service is about the sharing the Gospel or the good news about Jesus.

No one has ever given up more than Jesus in service to others. Our minds cannot even fathom what it must have been like for Jesus to go from the glory of heaven to the weakness of human form. The contrast in that move should be enough to motivate us to follow his example.

But of course he followed that up with his perfect life here on earth. He felt the weakness of his human needs many times as he spent long hours tending to the needs of the others. Masses of people crowded around him from early in the day till late night and he worked tirelessly to meet their needs by healing the sick, restoring the lame, cast out demons, refuted the religious leaders and telling everyone about the Kingdom of God.

All of this from the position of an unwed homeless man with no roof over his head, money in the bank or cattle in a field.

It makes me stop and wonder, have I ever really served others like Jesus did? Have I actually “denied” myself something in an effort to help someone else. Have I ever helped till it hurt?

And certainly this is not about trying to impress God with pointless hardship, like a starving monk or something. It is actually a sin to not enjoy the good gifts of God to his glory (1 Tim 4:1-5) but... its just as much of a sin to hold on to them so tightly that we wouldn’t allow ourselves to give them up when it hurt. Especially if it kept us from sharing the good news of Jesus Christ with them.

Philippians 2:5–8 (ESV)

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

We need to Be ready to serve like Jesus did. (to deny ourselves)

Secondly we need to

Be ready to suffer like Jesus (pick up your cross)

At the beginning of this series we looked at these words in context, recognizing that to the first audience the message of “taking up one’s cross” was a scary one. Today we might casually say something like, “Yeah, that’s just her cross to bear” but nobody who ever walked by a crucifixion spoke casually about carrying a cross.

This declaration of death was so unsettling, but if we stop and think about it, isn’t that exactly what becoming a follower of Christ is all about. Not to die in the physical sense, but to put our old life, it’s sin nature and self focus to death in order to follow Jesus. And what better symbol for that then the cross that put sin to death for us in the first place?

But the cross was not just about death. As I said, the cross was designed to be a public spectacle so that not only did you suffer terrible physical pain, you also suffered public humiliation and shame as well as alienation from pretty much anyone who ever knew you.

By God’s grace, we don’t currently live in a country where we face the threat of physical pain for our faith in Jesus, but public humiliation toward Christians and their Biblical values is growing fast. In our country, you will quickly face criticism if you just follow what most of our founding fathers understood to be self-evident truth. This is where every Christian is heading… unless they don’t stick with Jesus.

Unless we, like Peter, try and make Jesus into a Savior that is more to our liking and his teachings to something more politically correct and publically palatable.

Lately I have been really captivated by the German Pastor and Martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer. He was a pastor in Germany during WW2 and one of the few early voices to reject the godless rule of Adolph Hitler. The similarities between the timidity of the Church in Germany and the Church in America today are frightening.

In his book “The Cost of Discipleship” Bonhoeffer wrote:

“When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die. Suffering then is the badge of true discipleship. The disciple is not above his master. If we refuse to take up our cross and submit to suffering and rejection at the hands of men, we forfeit our fellowship with Christ and have ceased to follow him.” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer The Cost of Discipleship

To be clear, “to pick up our cross” is not just to experience the normal hardships of life, and especially not hardships that we have made with our own poor decisions. That could be God disciplining us! No, picking up our cross is about suffering because we have publically aligned ourselves with message and mission of Jesus. It’s “The Cost of Discipleship”, as Bonhoeffer wrote.

But it is not all duty and no delight, because the greater the cost, the greater the reward. Jesus said in

Matthew 5:11–12 (ESV)

“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

This is a perfect lead up into the last of these three ways in which our mission is shaped by the cross. And if I am honest I am glad to leave us on a something of a high note. Because we do need to...

Be ready to JOYFULLY serve like Jesus and we do need to

Be ready to suffer like Jesus but best of all we need to

Be ready to celebrate with Jesus!(follow Jesus)

Do you know what following Jesus gets you? It gets you JESUS!

He will be with you always to the end of the age and he will lead you into everything good, right and God honoring. He will take all that creative potential that He put in you and develop it for God’s greatest glory and your greatest good. Yes, there is a cost to being a disciple of Jesus, but it…is…so…worth it!

Mark 10:29–30 (ESV)

Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life.

I am not a wall street guy, but onehundred fold sounds like a pretty good return on your investment. And that is promised in this time right now.

The primary way in which this comes to us is through belonging to a local Church. The Christian Church was never meant to be a catalog of professional programs or a disconnected theatrical performance that you could just as easy watch online as show up in person. The Bible describes the Church as a family and if you are not a part of a Church like that then you are missing out on one of the best blessings that God has given His children.

If you want to find out more about what that looks like here then just contact myself or one of the other Overseers, our names are in the program and we would love to show you what that looks like here in our Friendship Church family.

But Jesus didn’t just say that we would be rewarded in the here and now, in fact he said that reward comes “with persecutions”. But the greatest reward is to spend all of eternity in a right relationship with our perfectly loving savior in heaven.

Mark 8:35–36 (ESV)

For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?

The best thing about following Jesus, is that you get Jesus. That is reward enough, but the Bible promises even greater rewards for those who carry their cross well in this life. It is just such a good trade!

And consider the alternative, for Mark 8 continues to say...

Mark 8:38 (ESV)

For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”

Gospel Application

This is our mission that was shaped by the cross.

“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

Landing

So my hope is that from here on out, if ever you stop to consider what the Cross of Jesus Christ means for His people, these Four words will come to mind.

Because the Cross is about is about Freedom, Forgiveness and Justice and the Mission of those who operate under the banner of the cross is to deny ourselves, pick up our cross and Follow Jesus.

I invite the worship team to take their places while we pray into that together!