Scattered Sheep, Steadfast Shepherd

Introduction

As people, especially as Americans, we have a tendency toward over-confidence. Take, for example, a poll that was done in 2021. Americans were surveyed and asked which of the following animals do you think you could beat in a fight if you were unarmed. 70% said they could take on a house cat. 60% said they could take on a goose. But it’s the 6% of Americans I want to talk about who said that they could, even if unarmed, take on a grizzly bear. 8% also said they could beat a lion and an elephant. What would you even do to an elephant? This is delusional thinking and a misplaced over-confidence in our abilities. We are very good at this! And as we see in this passage, we do it with our faith.

Our passage today has Peter insisting to Jesus: I will not fall away! Others might, but I won’t!” Jesus then tells him, “the truth is, Peter, you will deny me three times in a matter of hours.” But Mark reports his emphatic reply: “If I must die with you, I will not deny you!” It’s an overconfidence in his own strength to remain faithful. And what Peter will face is nothing compared to what Jesus faces, and Jesus remains perfectly faithful and obedient. Jesus could takes on something far greater than a grizzly bear; Peter folds at the first question by a servant girl.

And this gets to our main idea today: While we flee from lesser trials, Jesus’ obedience in the ultimate suffering secures our salvation and hope forever. We will see the extraordinary obedience of Jesus for our sake, the weight that was put on the good shepherd for the sake of his sheep.

The Sheep will Scatter

Jesus and the disciples have moved, they are no longer at the table set for a meal, but at the Mount of Olives, near a garden that is called Gethsemane. Here Jesus recognizes what is about to happen and he is now anticipating the way his followers will respond. Mark 14:27 “27 And Jesus said to them, “You will all fall away, for it is written, ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’”

He quotes the prophet Zechariah, that the shepherd will be struck and the sheep will scatter. He identifies Himself with the shepherd in the prophecy and sees his coming death as the strike the prophet mentions. The disciples have always been his sheep and they will run away, abandon him, deny him, seek to save their own skin. They distance their association with Jesus for fear of getting the same treatment that Jesus will get.

We can’t have one or the other. We can’t just hang around Jesus when the good things are happening. Paul in the book of Romans writes we are: Romans 8:17 “heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.” We share in Christ’s suffering and we share in his glory. But our temptation will always be, when things are bad to get out, to flee, to deny.

Jesus warns about this kind of response to his word and His kingdom in the parable of the Sower. In that story there are different seeds spread on different soils, and the seed sewn among the rocks springs up right away but then is scorched and wilts as soon as the sun rises. Jesus even gives an explanation, Mark 4:16–17 “16 And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: the ones who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy. 17 And they have no root in themselves, but endure for a while; then, when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away.” As soon as things get hard, they fall away. This is a great temptation for us!

Peter, we love Peter, in over-confidence, or arrogance, or just an overestimation of his faith, insists: not I! He swears an loyalty to Jesus so complete that he insists, if I have to die, so be it!

Peter is offended by Jesus’s suggestion, offended at the prediction of unfaithfulness. But to be offended by Jesus, the one who knows our hearts better than we know ourselves, the one who was there in the beginning and through whom all things were made, to be offended betrays a lack of faith, an unbelief. No, Jesus, you couldn’t possibly be right! I don’t believe you! Peter is saying. You’re wrong.

But Jesus is insistent, No, Peter, you’ll deny me three times. The threefold denial indicates the thoroughness of Peter’s failure to acknowledge Jesus even hours after pledging allegiance. But who of us would say anything different? Of course we’d defend ourselves and insist our loyalty.

What would a proper response from Peter have been? Peter insists he won’t fall, though the Son of God says He will. An appropriate response? If I will fall, then have mercy on me! I’ll deny you? Then help my unbelief! Trust that our savior is right and knows us better than we do, and trust more deeply in his grace to forgive and restore!

All of these disciples will scatter, not just Peter. They will fall asleep while their teacher is in agony in this garden. Such is the weakness of their faith and such is the weakness of our faith. This is us and that’s OK, We’re sheep and we can trust that though we are weak, we will be safe and restored, not because of who we are or what we’ve done, but because of who our shepherd is!

And this is the warning for us today, we cannot be tempted to think too highly of ourselves. Do no overestimate the strength of our faith or underestimate our need for Jesus. We may not find ourselves denying Jesus in some dramatic moment, facing life and death persecution. But it may be the smalls ways, in our workplaces, among our friends or even our families when we functionally deny Jesus. It’s minimizing our faith when it’s socially convenient or ignoring our call to obedience to serve ourselves and protect our reputations. We must instead trust in the strength of our savior, remind ourselves daily of His goodness.

But Jesus is careful to offer hope, he says, Mark 14:28 “28 But after I am raised up, I will go before you to Galilee.”” We’ll talk about this more in a few minutes, but remember this: Jesus’ prediction of their failure and denial is balanced by his promise of their restoration with Him.

The Son will drink the cup

We’ll come back to that, but first we ask, how is it that Jesus could so confidently speak of their restoration? The reason Jesus could speak so confidently of their future hope is because of His ultimate obedience here in the garden through to the cross.

Mark 14:33 “33 And he took with him Peter and James and John, and began to be greatly distressed and troubled.” 34 And he said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death. Remain here and watch.””

Greatly distressed and troubled. The language Mark uses to describe Jesus’ state of mind is forceful and should shake us. It could read that he was profoundly disturbed; he experienced a great terror! He was startled! These strong words carry with them a sense of alarm!

What was it? What was so startling to Jesus? What filled him with such profound dread, dread to the point of agony. The answer to that question is in Jesus’ prayer: Mark 14:36 “36 And he said, “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.””

Remove this cup from me. Jesus is moved to terror because of the cup set before Him. What is this cup? The cup was an image used in the Old Testament for God’s wrath being poured out on the wicked and unrighteous. Isaiah 51:17 “17 Wake yourself, wake yourself, stand up, O Jerusalem, you who have drunk from the hand of the Lord the cup of his wrath, who have drunk to the dregs the bowl, the cup of staggering.”

He is facing something far greater than physical torture or death, he’s facing the cup of God’s wrath poured out on Him. The pouring out of divine justice on human sin. This was the plan, no longer in theory, but in reality for the Son, that He would bear the weight of our sin and that the wrath of the Father would be poured out on Him.

2 Corinthians 5:21 “21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

Jesus going in our place and bearing the punishment that was meant for us, the wrath of God on our sin.

And what does this reveal about God? It shows us that he is not indifferent to suffering and evil in this world. He is not complacent about our sin. Evil in the world faces His anger and moves him to wrath.

But it also shows us this: this is how dearly we are loved! We may struggle with the anger of God, it might make us uncomfortable, but God is angry at sin because He is perfectly holy and just and because He loves His creation. He is angry with how sin has twisted this world. His wrath should startle us! But as much as we may struggle with the wrath of God, it shows that He is not indifferent to pain, suffering, sin, and death.

What we see here is remarkable: a holy God whose justice demands punishment for sin chooses to bear that punishment himself rather than pour it out on us.

The good news is this: God loves us dearly and we are so valued by Him, so loved by Him, that these are the lengths he goes and weight He bears for our sake!

So back to our scene in the garden. It seems as though, in this moment, Jesus is catching a glimpse of that cup which is set before him. He is getting a foretaste of what will happen on the cross—not the physical pain and suffering, but the spiritual anguish, the experience of being separated from the Father and bearing the punishment of our sin! He’s peering into the cup of wrath awaiting Him. And He will do this all on his own, there is a loneliness here for our savior as his disciples will scatter and they can do nothing but fall asleep in this moment of agony.

Whatever he had resolved to do before, He was coming face-to-face with the grim reality of it now in the garden. Dane Ortlund helps us understand the gravity of this moment:

“When communion with God had been one’s oxygen, one’s meat and drink, throughout one’s whole life, without a single moment of interruption by sin—to suddenly bear the unspeakable weight of all our sins? Who could survive that? To lose that depth of communion with the Father was to die…The world’s Light was going out.

Why? Why would the Father have the son see a glimpse of the agony to come? At this point, Jesus could have stood up and walked away. No, this is too much! Let’s figure something else out.

Jonathan Edwards offered this answer: God first brought him and set him at the mouth of the furnace of wrath, that he might look in and view its fierce and raging flames, and might see where he was going, and might voluntarily enter into it and bear it for sinners, knowing what it was.

This is astonishing! He sees what is coming and he doesn’t flee. He doesn’t scatter like the sheep. But he also doesn’t pretend like it’s all just fine. He sees that this is agony! It’s real and terrible and yet he chooses obedience to the Father for our sake.

The Shepherd will restore

And while this is going on. While the son is catching a glimpse of the agony of the cross and choosing that terrible cup, what are the disciples doing? They’re sleeping! Three times he finds them sleeping while he is in the greatest distress of his life.

And he specifically told them, stay awake and on watch. But such is their inability to do what the Lord has commanded. And as weak as they are, see how Jesus treats them. He is gentle with them in their weakness, he does not shame them.

He doesn’t say: hey! What are you doing? Look at what I’m about to do for you and you can’t even stay awake? So ungrateful!

No! He recognizes their weakness but also sees their hearts: Mark 14:38 “38 Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”” He’s saying: I can see your heart is in the right place and I see that you just can’t do it.

Even in this greatest hour of need, he is caring for his followers and friends. Truly this is the good shepherd, concerned for his sheep until the very end.

Remember what he said at the beginning of this passage, it’s related: that confident promise that once he is raised he will go before them to Galilee (Mark 14:28 “28 But after I am raised up, I will go before you to Galilee.”” ) And in these few short verses Jesus offers a future promise of restoration (in His resurrection) and a present grace and care, showing mercy at toward their tired eyes.

In his greatest trial, Jesus understands our weakness and reassures us of our future. This is how he loves us and promises to restore us.

He does not go to the cross despite our weakness, begrudgingly going to save us despite our failures and sin, our tired eyes. No, he goes precisely because of these things! Because we cannot save ourselves, we cannot facilitate our own restoration. He sees our weakness and knows the only solution!

What then, for us today? Jesus gives us a model for walking through suffering—and His is a suffering we will never have to face. He does not flee, though this is precisely what the world would have us do. Circumstances hard? Run! Move to a new city, new job, new relationship! Nor is he totally detached. He is distressed! The emotions he feels are real, we can enter into real despair.

Suffering, then, is an opportunity to remain steadfast in our obedience to God (not fleeing) and knowing that our hope lies ahead. We need not flee nor become cynical and detached. We move deeper into trust of our savior who took on great suffering so we could be saved!

When we know this and the truth of the gospel as we see it in this passage. When we understand this deeply, then we can walk through any hardship (it won’t be easy!) but we can do so knowing just how valued we are by our loving savior. Do you see what he did for us? If there’s any doubt that He loves you, any doubt that he cares for you, remember the promise of this story. That though He knows they will flee, he will restore them.

We need not rely on ourselves and our own strength, but trust wholly on His strength to save and restore! When we falter and fail, when we fall asleep on God, we don’t have to run further from him, and we don’t have to come back to him with our heads down in shame. We come to the open arms of our God who has already paid the price of our failure and who promises to restore us!

And how can he say these things?

How is it that he can always be a reassuring presence for us, always offering us hope? If this reassurance depended on us at all, we would be doomed! For as we’ve seen, we will flee, we will scatter, we will fall asleep on God.

No! Jesus can reassure them and us of restoration because of who He is. His faithfulness under the ultimate pressure becomes the foundation of His grace in our failure.

Because He was obedient, we are made clean.

Because He drank the cup of God’s wrath, we are spared and shown mercy.

Because He was destroyed and left alone, we will never be alone!

Because He loved us to the very end, into despair, into the terror of the cup, we have hope forever! Amen.

Prayers of the People:

Lord God, we thank you for the astonishing, precious, truth that is the gospel of your son Jesus. We thank you for his incomprehensible sacrifice for us. And we thank you that you, Father, are not complacent toward sin and suffering. We thank you that all sin is under your justice and the object of your wrath. And we endlessly thank you that your Son took that wrath on Himself for us.

Lord let us not depart from this truth! Let us treasure it every day, let us revel in the sweetness of the Gospel, that Jesus took the cup that should have been set for us. And Lord we thank you for your restoring grace that meets us when we falter and fail. When we scatter like sheep from their shepherd, we thank you that you will restore us.

Lord, let us be faithful people; let us walk through the pain of persecution, the trial of suffering well, not out of our own strength, but because of how Jesus walked through these things perfectly and obediently, to the point of death on the cross.

Thank you for the reality of the resurrection, that as we share in his suffering, we share in Christ’s resurrection and new life as well.

Father, I ask that as we more deeply believe and understand this good news, that we would make it our ambition to share it with others, to the ends of the earth!

We pray these things in Jesus’ name, and now we join, in one voice, to pray those words your son taught us:

Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. And give us this day, our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power and glory forever and ever. Amen.