Mark 8:31-9:1

The True Nature of Discipleship

We are going to string together the last couple of sermons because they really do build on each other and they tie together. What we have talked about for the last few weeks and this week will flow seamlessly into next week as well.

If you haven’t done so yet, sit down and read the Gospel of Mark in one sitting and ask God to show you thematic things as you read!

(element of seeing).

Jesus is the exclusive, heaven-sent, satisfier of our souls.

He is the only source of eternal satisfaction. (8:1-10)

Undeniable proof of this has already been given. (8:11-13)

We need to to remember what He has done. (8:14-21)

Recognizing this reality is a process. (8:22-26)

ultimately…

We must confess our belief in true identity of Jesus. (8:27-30)

and when we do we begin a discipleship journey where we start to see Jesus in all His glory.

Let’s read…

Mark 8:27–28 ESV

27 And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. And on the way he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” 28 And they told him, “John the Baptist; and others say, Elijah; and others, one of the prophets.”

Mark 8:29–30 ESV

29 And he asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Christ.” 30 And he strictly charged them to tell no one about him.

Mark 8:31–32 (ESV)

31 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. 32 And he said this plainly.

Mark 8:32–33 (ESV)

32 And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33 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.”

Mark 8:34–35 ESV

34 And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 35 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it.

Mark 8:36–37 ESV

36 For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? 37 For what can a man give in return for his soul?

Mark 8:38–9:1 ESV

38 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.” 1 And he said to them, “Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God after it has come with power.”

There is so much to see here as we attempt to discover the True Nature of Discipleship.

The true nature of discipleship is learning to see Jesus in all His glory.

You and I need to work hard at letting Jesus be who He really is. He is the teacher, we are the students. We need to see Him as He is and then let Him teach us to see everything from His perspective. In this account we see the disciples combat and comically try to correct Jesus plain teaching. They reverse the roles and they as students try to teach the teacher. And the true teacher strongly disapproves of that pompous, questioning attitude.

At this point, the disciples still have much more learn and much more glory to see in their Messiah.

The first thing they need to see glory is is that fact that:

Jesus: the anointed and appointed One to suffer for the sins of His people.(8:30-33)

Last week we talked about the word “Christ” and how it was loaded with meaning. The most basic meaning of being the “Messiah” identified an individual who had been divinely elected and appointed to a particular task. They had a special endowment of power and set aside to perform the task that has been appointed to them.

But Peter and the crew have a misperception about the role of the Messiah. They don’t see things clearly yet. And knowing this, Jesus doesn want the false perception to spread so

Mark 8:30 (ESV)

30 And he (Jesus) strictly charged them to tell no one about him.

and about His identity. He wanted to control the narrative and preserve the true role of the Messiah and so He begins to teach.

Mark 8:31–32 (ESV)

31 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. 32 And he said this plainly.

Ok. This is pretty plain and simple. No more complex riddles or parables to sort through, just plain teaching. Here are the cold hard facts of what will happen to me.

First He says that He is the “Son of Man” which is another loaded with meaning term. By using this term Jesus is drawing on the Jewish traditions from the Old Testament that recognize the Son of Man figure from Daniel 7 as someone who has been given authority to rule over a kingdom.

When the disciples heard that term Son of Man, I am sure that adrenaline shot through their bodies. They were ready to take up arms for all the fallen and oppressed and announce an insurrection against Rome.

Did Jesus really just say the phrase, Son of Man. Are we going to see this prophecy fulfilled in our time in this man? Is now the time the Kingdom will be restored?

But, Jesus blew their understanding out of the water with what He said after He used the title Son of Man. Because what He begins to teach is that the Son of Man, MUST suffer many things and be rejected by the people that it has long been assumed that He would lead. And then be killed? And then rise again after three days?

What are you talking about?

They just didn’t have a category for any of the teachings that were coming our of this Messiah’s mouth.

Then Mark really takes a jab at the disciples when He indicates that, Jesus said these things “plainly” to them. Ok guys heres the deal. You hear me. This is it. This is what is about to unfold. This isn’t a prediction…this is what is coming down the pike at me and all who follow me.

This is the straight up truth of the matter and they just didn’t get it.

Do you see yourself there ever? Have you ever heard a very straight forward, plain teaching of Jesus and failed to unite that teaching with active faith that acts on what God’s Word has said no matter how you feel knowing that God promises a good result even if you don’t see it at the time?

I can check yes to that box until my pen runs out of ink.

Just read the beginning 9 verses in the Sermon on the Mount and ask yourself if your life demonstrates what you have been plainly taught!

Here Jesus is saying His role as the Messiah was to be the Son of Man who was simultaneously the Suffering Servant. All those OT promises are finding their Yes and their fulfillment in Him.

The author of Hebrews says that this was fitting…

Hebrews 2:10 ESV

10 For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering.

And Peter still wasn’t understanding the very plain teaching to the degree that he…

Mark 8:32 (ESV)

32 And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.

Peter tried to make the teacher become the student and he boldly pulls Jesus aside and doesn’t just “rebuke” him, but “began to rebuke him,” which indicates that Peter had quite a list that he wanted to get through. This wasn’t just a “one and done” rebuke and censure, this is a laundry list of things that Peter wants to get off his chest about this “plain teaching” he just heard.

This is a scene man. Peter makes a scene right after Jesus had basically told Him not draw attention to what He had just taught. (Good Grief!)

The rebuke that Peter gives is so opposite of what Jesus, the Messiah, Son of Man was anointed and appointed to do.

Peter’s tired to stop Jesus from being the Savior of the World! That is what was at stake.

The message of these words are so contrary to what God had designed for Him that Jesus quickly recognizes the evil behind the them and says,

And so Mark writes,

Mark 8:33 (ESV)

33 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 associates Peter’s words with Satan’s voice. That is is how the evil one works. He tries to deceive you and deter you from doing that which God has called you to do.

We are all so susceptible to this. We sometimes can give in at a moments notice. Sometimes we are just looking for any opportunity we can to divert from the path that God has us on. We long for and look for many excuses to not follow in His steps.

And this happens when we don’t “set our minds on the things of God.”

We can get ourselves into a whole heap of trouble when we don’t set our minds on the things of God.

Sometime we find an excuse to not set our minds on the things of God because we are deceived into thinking that our minds have a mind of their own. We think that we can’t control the intrusive thoughts from coming into our minds so we might as well just dwell on them.

We get filled with anxiety and it makes us gittery and short with other and self-consumed.

The antidote for this way of living is to “set your mind on the things of God.”

Disciples set their minds on things above. (8:33)

This isn’t just the power of “positive thinking.” Positive thinking so often ignores real suffering and hardship and positive thinking has no capacity to redeem misery and misfortune.

Setting your mind on the things of God, however is “renewing your mind” in such a way that we think about the events of our life rightly. We can take our thoughts captive and face the hard realities of life and recognize that the Lord who has the capacity and power to give, also can take away. We need to know what Job knew when He said that the Lord is worthy to be praised either way.

We need to know what Joseph knew when he said…

Genesis 50:20 (ESV)

20 As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive…

This mindset finds it ultimate fulfillment in the heart posture of the Lord Jesus Christ.

What happened to Jesus proves this point beyond any shadow of doubt.

He was appointed to suffer, to be rejected and He was killed and that sequence of events, “that taking away if you will” created the means by which we could experience His glory for eternity!

His death paved a way for our victory. And so even when He was undergoing tremendous suffering, He set His mind on the things of God and was able to press on for the joy set before Him!

When we are filled with anxiety or fear, rather than just assuming that “everything will just be okay,” we would do much better to meditate on the fact that even if what we fear came true, God can make beauty rise out of the ashes, much like the breathless, lifeless lungs of Christ started to expand and contract on that third day.

Don’t minimize or ignore the hardships you are experiencing. Grab hold of them and cast them in the direction of the Lord knowing that He cares for you. Pour out your lament to Him and ask Him to show you His glory that can turn even hard things for our good.

This is hard and this takes training, but the true nature of discipleship is learning to see Jesus in all His glory at all times. Ever single moment of every single day is a teaching moment.

Jesus takes advantage of this massive moment of failure for Peter and leverages that failure into a teaching moment so that Peter, His not yet fully trained disciple might understand that he must, “set his mind on the things of God.”

This is a choice.

This is what Jesus was going to have to do as He made His way to the cross. This mindset is what would eventually come out of mouth in the garden when He says, “Not my will by thy will be done.”

The posture of His heart said, I will set my mind on the things of God.

They only way we can in step with Jesus as He heads to the cross is if we set our minds on things above. We need that perspective because discipleship is essentially loosing your life in order to find it.

Disciples take up their cross and follow. (8:34-36)

Mark 8:34–35 (ESV)

34 And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 35 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it.

Thomas à Kempis wrote: Jesus today has many who love his heavenly kingdom, but few who carry his cross.

I have mentioned this before, we follow in the footsteps of a crucified Messiah. And here our Messiah explains it in very large font. This isn’t like the fine print at the bottom of an infomercial. This is up front loud and clear. The cross that He was about to bear, wouldn’t be His to bear alone. If we follow Him, we will also have to put something to death.

Our old nature must die. We must deny ourselves.

This is SOOOOOO COUNTER CULTURAL. Follow your heart. Do what feels right. Be who you want to be. (BLAH BLAH BLAH)

The call to follow Jesus is a call to deny yourself.

we must deny ourselves…man if we could just do that more often we would look so much more like Christ and there would be far less chaos in our worlds.

We look our for number one so often, but the way to experience abundant life is to consider yourself third.

Junior High Ministry back in Chicago made t-shirts that said two words: “I’m Third.” God, Others than me.

The first of the 10 commandments tells us that God is God and there shall be no other god’s before Him.

And this amazing God

Humbly came to the Earth He created in order to take up a cross and die so that we might live. God demonstrated His love by giving His Son to be the sin bearer and Jesus humbled Himself to becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.

And if we mimic HIs movements we will start to…

Philippians 2:3 ESV

3 Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.

So in our discipleship, we are learning to think of ourselves less often. We are learning to deny ourselves and take up an instrument of torture so that over time we will eventually kill our old way of living.

The goal of our discipleship is to look like Him, be like Him and do as He did. And He carried a cross, so that is what we must do as well.

We are His disciple and it is all-encompassing discipleship and it will cost us everything.

And that is a huge cost and it is also a cost that Jesus doesn’t ignore or take lightly so He does a cost analysis for us. He crunches the number so to speak so we can see that it is worth it.

He continues addressing this mixed crowd of disciples and those who just so happened to be there and says,

Mark 8:36–37 ESV

36 For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? 37 For what can a man give in return for his soul?

The only honest answer is, Nothing. If you forfeit your soul, the immaterial part of you that makes you, you, there is nothing worth that. Many of us have had the sobering experience of being around the dead body of someone we have loved. Yes the shell is there, but the soul is gone and that makes all the difference in the world. All that is left to do with that shell of a body is plant it in the ground and wait for the resurrection.

Humans are embodied souls. Don’t undervalue your soul by chasing after everything the world offers, when Jesus alone is the exclusive, heaven-sent satisfier of your soul.

That will be way to costly. Do everything you can to be like Him in every way. That will cost you something and the cost will be worth it.

It isn’t my most favorite song, but the words are so good.

“All I once held dear, built my life upon All this world reveres and wars to own; All I once thought gain I have counted loss, Spent and worthless now compared to this. Knowing You, Jesus, knowing You There is no greater thing.”

Is it worth it? Is it worth losing your life to follow in the footsteps of a crucified Messiah? Well if following in His footsteps means arriving in glory someday…absolutley. Don’t get bogged down with only the here and now, when God has set eternity in the hearts of humans. It is appointed for us to die once and then face judgement…so is it worth losing your life now to gain it then for etenity?

Yes. Absolutly Yes. In fact there is no greater thing.

Finally,

Disciples are not ashamed of Jesus. (8:38-9:1)

Mark 8:38–9:1 (ESV)

38 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.” 1 And he said to them, “Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God after it has come with power.”

There is no shame in living this way. If you live this way you will eventually see the face of God and it will be smiling at you. That will be worth it.

2 Corinthians 4:5–6 ESV

5 For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. 6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

Acts 14:22 ESV

22 strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.

Discipleship is essentially learning how to see Jesus in all His glory.

A disciple sets His mind on things of God. (not temporary)

A disciple takes up His cross and follows. (Willing and eager to lose His life in order to find it).

A disciple is not ashamed of Jesus.

Benediction

Following Jesus transforms everything about the way you experienced life in this fallen place. Talk about practical life application. When you run into a trial, you can actually begin to considerate joy! How many people can think that way. That is completely counterintuitive to the way that we are naturally wired. The only way that happens is if you were born again. if you’re living out and a new redeemed humanity. You can walk through the valley of the shadow of death when the deep darkness starts to consume you and draws you in like a magnet you will fear no evil because you know that he is with you.