The Road to the Cross

The Road to the Cross

Mark 10:32-45

     A hero is valiant. Someone who displays bravery in the face of adversity. Someone who courageously puts themselves in harms way for the benefit of others even to the point of death. When I think of heroism, I think of those who serve our country in the armed forces overseas. I think of the police officer responding to the 911 call, never knowing what is waiting on the other side. I think of the firemen who runs into the burning building and his first goal is not the protection of property, but the preservation of life. A hero is someone who snatches victory from the jaws of defeat at great risk to themselves.

     There is no greater hero who has ever lived than the Lord Jesus Christ. No one had a greater understanding of the danger that waited for Him than Jesus. No one ever gave more of Himself for the benefit of others than Jesus did. He is the epitome of a hero because He set His sights on the will of God and would not be stopped. And that is what we will see in this passage this morning. Jesus is our hero who sets the example for us of how to live for God. (Mark 10:32-45)

  32      They were on the road going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking on ahead of them; and they were amazed, and those who followed were fearful. And again He took the twelve aside and began to tell them what was going to happen to Him,

  33      saying, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes; and they will condemn Him to death and will hand Him over to the Gentiles.

  34      “They will mock Him and spit on Him, and scourge Him and kill Him,and three days later He will rise again.”

  35      aJames and John, the two sons of Zebedee, *came up to Jesus, saying, “Teacher, we want You to do for us whatever we ask of You.”

  36      And He said to them, “What do you want Me to do for you?”

  37      They said to Him, “Grant that we may sit, one on Your right and one on Your left, in Your glory.”

  38      But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?”

  39      They said to Him, “We are able.” And Jesus said to them, “The cup that I drink you shall drink; and you shall be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized.

  40      “But to sit on My right or on My left, this is not Mine to give; but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.”

  41      Hearing this, the ten began to feel indignant with James and John.

  42      Calling them to Himself, Jesus *said to them, “You know that those who are recognized as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them; and their great men exercise authority over them.

  43      “But it is not this way among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant;

  44      and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be slave of all.

  45      “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” (Pray)

     In our passage this morning we see Jesus in heroic fashion, set His sights on Jerusalem and the road that lies ahead of Him. He is focused, He is determined, and He is moving forward into the will of God for His life. He will not be detoured for it was for this very purpose He came into the world. And now, we see His bravery on full display. The goal is insight, and the plan of God is unfolding. His mission is a must, and failure is not an option. No matter how difficult the circumstances are there is no turning back. He is locked in and in full pursuit of the plan of God.

     He is also fully aware of what is in front of Him. He is fully aware of the depths of the pain and suffering He will endure. Yet He is focused on the victory He will achieve. He is going to Jerusalem to give His life for the salvation of the world. And as I read this passage, I cannot help but admire Him. He is as bold as a lion in pursuit of God’s plan, and we should trust Him and follow the example He gives us. What we learn from this passage is: Jesus is our hero who sets the example of how to live for God.

     The first thing I want you to see in this passage is the Determination, Vs. 32-34. Jesus is determined in His pursuit of God’s will.

     Vs. 32 begins with, “They were on the road going up to Jerusalem.” The word “they” here is referring to Jesus and the disciples. They are traveling south through Judea, but they are going up to Jerusalem. It is important to understand that Jerusalem sets 2500 feet above sea level in the hills of Judea. It is truly as the Bible calls it, “a city set on a hill.” So, it doesn’t matter if you are traveling North, South, East, or West you are always going up to Jerusalem. Jesus and His disciples are traveling on foot, straight up hill through long and winding roads, and they have about twenty miles to go, it will take them some time to get there.

     But what is more important is why they are going there. There going to celebrate the Passover. Every year the Jewish people make the pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the Passover. The Passover is an annual event and the most important of all the Jewish festivals. It is a festival to commemorate the passing over of the angel of death who took the first born of Egypt on the night before the Exodus.

     On that night a lamb was slain and it’s blood was placed on the door posts of the house and when the angel of death saw the blood he would Passover that house. This all took place on the night before God’s people were delivered from slavery in Egypt. Then they began their pilgrimage into the holy land.

     So, every year the Jewish people commemorate that event. So, they do not forget what God has done for them. And every year a lamb is slain to remind them of the power of the blood. How it covered them and delivered them from the angel of death. That is what we see taking place in this story. It is that time of the year and Jesus is making His way to Jerusalem for the Passover.

     Only this year will be different. Jesus will become the Passover lamb. He will become the fulfillment of the event. The Jews always believed the Passover was symbolic and that it would be fulfilled one day by the Messiah. When Jesus first came on the scene to be baptized by John the Baptist in the Jordan River. John looked at Him and said, “Behold, the lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world.”  In 1 Corinthians 5:7 Paul writes “That Christ our Passover has been slain.”

     Now Jesus is making the Journey up to Jerusalem where He will become the Passover Lamb. The symbolic finds it’s fulfillment. And He will become the one -time sacrifice for the sin of the world. That is how significant this story is. That is the setting of the scene. And yet we see Jesus moving forward in heroic fashion.

     Vs. 32 says, “And Jesus was walking on ahead of them.” I don’t want you to miss this. This important fact is only recorded for us in Mark. Matthew and Luke do not give us this information. Normally Jesus would walk along with His disciples, talking with them and teaching them, but not this time. This time He is walking out in front of everyone. Why? Because He is on a mission. He is determined to reach His destination.

     We know there is something significant taking place here because of the reaction of the disciples. “They were amazed and those who followed were fearful.” To be amazed is to be astonished. They could not believe their eyes.  Even the pilgrims who followed were afraid because everyone knew there was already a plot to kill Jesus by the priest, the scribes, and the Pharisee’s, and they were waiting for Him at Jerusalem.

     Yet, He moved forward with a purpose. He was not dragging His feet. There is no hesitation in His step. He is pursuing the will of God. His very thoughts are recorded for us in Isaiah 50:7 it says, “I have set my face like a flint.” Luke 9:51 says, He was determined to go to Jerusalem.”

     In October of 1944 during the second world war. When it was becoming obvious to the Japanese that time was running out. They had lost several important battles and they were losing pilots faster than they could train their replacements. They began enlisting Kamikaze’s to fly suicide missions into American ships off the coast of Okinawa. It was part of a death code that was entrenched in the Japanese military that began all the way back with the samurai. They believed it was more honorable to die than be defeated. So, they flew their planes on a mission of death, determined to defeat the enemy. In the same way Jesus was on a mission and He was determined to die for the sin of the world.

     It is important to understand the disciples still didn’t grasp the significance of what was taking place, and we see that in Vs. 33-34. Jesus stops and call them together to explain it to them again. This is the third time Jesus will predict His death and resurrection. But it is obvious by their reaction, and what we see from James and John later, they still believed Jesus was going to Jerusalem to establish a Kingdom on earth. All they knew at this moment was that Jesus was moving forward and He was determined to get there.

     Jesus teaches us we should be determined in our pursuit of the will of God. We should be determined in the way we work. We should be determined in the way we go to school. We should be determined in the way we approach our marriage. We should be determined in the way we raise our children.  We should be determined in the way we go about our witness to the world. We should pursue whatever God sets before us with determination.  Paul writes in Philippians 3:13, “This one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind I press forth toward the mark of the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”

     That is the Determination. Jesus is our hero who sets the example of how to live for God. The next thing I want you to see in this passage is the Submission, Vs. 35-40. Jesus was completely surrendered to the will of God.

     Most of the time, when I have taught this passage in the past, I have focused on the pride of James and John. And truly their request is stunning considering Jesus has just told them that He is going to suffer and die. All they are interested in is glory for themselves. They are self-consumed. They come to Jesus and say, “Teacher we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.”

     They sound like immature children who are trying to get their parents to say yes before they tell them what they want. And I can’t help but think that many times this is exactly how our prayer life sounds. God, I want you to do for me whatever I ask of you instead of God what is it that you want me to do for you. But, today, I want to focus on the way Jesus responds to them, because it reveals to us how fully aware He was of the moment.

     Vs. 38 He says, “You don’t know what you are asking.” In other words, He says, to James and John you have no idea what you are talking about. You don’t understand the price that has to be paid. There is no way they could fathom. There is no way they could even count the cost of what Jesus was going to do. Then Jesus gives them these two figures of speech, these two metaphors. He says, “Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized by the baptism with which I am baptized?”

     You see the cup Jesus is speaking of here is a metaphor for the wrath of God on the sin of the world. Jesus was getting ready to take all of the sin, for all time on Himself. The punishment of hell and death for every person who ever lives. The physical part of Christ dying was the easy part. But it was the spiritual part of His death that would be difficult. And this cup is a metaphor that represents the sin of the world.

     I am reminded of when Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane and He prayed and sweated teardrops of blood and He said, “Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me.” Which by the way wasn’t possible. And He said, “nevertheless not my will but your will be done.”  He was completely surrendered to the will of God, and He suffered all that every person would have suffered if we would have all gone to hell for eternity. The Bible says, “God made Him who knew no sin to be sin that we might become the righteousness of God.” That is the cup He is referring to here. No one could possibly endure that cup only Jesus.

     The “baptism for which He is baptized” is a metaphor pointing to the cross. And He says, if you are going to sit near me in the Kingdom of God it requires a sacrifice that you don’t understand yet, but you will. Isn’t it ironic that James and John are asking for glory from the one who will pay the price for their glory? 

     Vs. 40 gives us an element of the sovereignty of God. He says, those places you desire are not mine to give but are given by God the Father. They are appointed by Him. Matthew 20:23 spells it out for us and says, “They are prepared by God the Father.” What we see here is Jesus surrendered to the will of God, submitted to the plan of God and the sovereign will of the Father in full control.

     Jesus teaches us here to surrender to the will of God. And sometimes the cup we are given is difficult and sometimes the path we walk is broken but the plan of God is always what is best for our lives. We have a tendency to blame God when things don’t go the way we want them to, but that is just because we are trying to force our will on Him rather than surrender to His will for us.

     That is the submission. Jesus is our hero who sets the example of how to live for God. The next thing I want you to see in this passage is the Servanthood, Vs. 41-45. Here Jesus teaches us what true greatness looks like, and He uses Himself as an example.

     After hearing what James and John did, the other disciples become indignant. They are angry. However, they are not angry about what James and John asked for, they are angry because James and John asked first. They were all thinking the same thing. So, Jesus uses this moment to teach them the great contrast between the way things work in the world and the way things work in the Kingdom. He begins in Vs. 42 by describing the way the world operates.

     Vs. 42 says, “you know that those who are recognized as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them.” I love that He says, “You know.” In other words, You understand these things. In fact, everyone knows how it works. Those who are in power exercise their authority over those who are beneath them. This is common knowledge. This is the way the world functions even today. In America there are people in Washington D.C. who make the rules and we follow them, whether we like them or not.

     Then in Vs. 43 we see the word “But,” and remember the word but is a contrast. It takes it in the opposite direction. He says, “But, it is not this way among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be slave to all.” The Kingdom of God does not operate the way the world operates. We are equally saved, and we are equally loved by God. The difference is placed on our desire to put God first in our lives and serve Him.

       I want you to notice there is nothing wrong with the desire to become great, there is no rebuke here from Jesus. The desire to be great is good and it is noble, but the way to greatness is different from the world. It means being a servant. D. L. Moody once said, “The measure of a man is not how many servants he has, but how many men he serves.”

     Finally, I want you to look at Vs. 45. It is the signature text of the Gospel of Mark.  Jesus says, “Just as the Son of man did not come to be served but to serve and give His life as a ransom for many.” The greatest example of everything we have just read is found in Jesus Himself. He became the greatest by becoming the servant. He became the greatest by becoming the slave of all. He came into the world to serve the will of God and to carry out the work of God. He drank the cup of the wrath of God to the last drop.

     And He teaches us to be a servant too. 1 Peter 4:10 says, each one of us has received a gift from God that we are to use to serve one another as stewards of the grace of God.

     I heard a story this week about a woman named Lydia Hart. She delivers meals to low-income senior citizens with the charity Meals on Wheels. “So, what,” you may say, “thousands of people do that.” But Lydia is 101 years old. She rides shotgun and navigates for her 72-year-old partner, helping the “little old ladies,” as she refers to her clients. She speaks of the blessing she gets from being a servant. “It’s fun for me and a chance to get out. It gives me something to do.”

Even at over a century old, Lydia takes what she has and gives it in the service of others. What a challenge to you and me.

     Jesus is our hero who sets the example of how to live for God and He teaches us that we are to do it with determination, submission, and servanthood. We have one opportunity at life. One chance to get this thing right. What are you going to do with that? What greater purpose can there be than being dedicated to God and living for Him?