God not doing something the way you think He should? Mark 8:31-33
“And He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32 He spoke this word openly. Then Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him. 33 But when He had turned around and looked at His disciples, He rebuked Peter, saying, “Get behind Me, Satan! For you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.””
Peter, go to the top of the class…oh wait…forget that
When Matt first asked me to speak on this passage, one of the first thoughts I had was, ‘Is there going to enough to say? It’s only three verses. What was I thinking? There is so much in this small section.
So last week we saw Peter in his moment of triumph correctly identifying Jesus as the Messiah. Top of the class for Peter. This week we see that Peter’s time at the top of the class was short-lived. It only took for him to open his mouth one more time and he’s moved back down. Well, not really. But have you ever had a time when you did really well in something and felt proud of yourself only to do really badly in something the next minute?
The Son of man
'And He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things’
Sometimes Jesus is referred to as the son of God meaning that he has always existed as the second person of the trinity. If you’re not familiar with the term trinity it’s a word that we use as Christians to refer to God who is one in being but three in person: the father, the son and the Holy Spirit. It’s quite a complex idea to get our head around but why should God be more simple than the complex world he has created? If you want to understand this more I really recommend that you watch Nabeel QurAyshi on YouTube explaining the trinity.
In this passage, Jesus doesn’t refer to himself as the son of God but as the son of Man referring to the fact that he is fully human too. But there is another level to this title. The book of Daniel in the Old Testament in the bible has a prophecy about a son of man in chapter 7, but this son of man wasn’t just human he was a divine person who would come in the future to put everything right.
So when Jesus says he’s the Son of Man he’s referring to the fact that he’s fully human but he’s also identifying Himself as this divine being mentioned in Daniel.
The suffering servant - why Peter fails so badly here
This passage is the first of three times that Jesus in the book of Mark tells the disciples he will suffer and be killed. As we’ve seen Peter is really upset by this idea and rebukes Jesus. Jesus who also happens to be God. It’s never a good idea to tell God off. He’s the one who sets what is right and what is wrong.
But why was Peter so upset? Since he was a child Peter would have been taught the prophecies in the scripture that talked about a Messiah who would come to set up a kingdom and make everything right. At this point in time, the Romans were the occupying force in the nation and the Jews were desperate to be free of them. They were expecting a powerful Messiah who would come and overthrow the Romans. They weren’t expecting someone who was going to suffer and be killed.
When we’ve been brought up to think in a certain way it can be hard to change that thinking in an instant especially when there’s a lot of emotion attached like there was for Peter.
We’re going to watch a short clip now from our friend John speaking. He mentions someone called Lindsey in the clip. Just so you know, Lindsey is his wife.
> Check out the YouTube Video link above and fast forward to about 24 minutes into the video.
After recording that video John messaged me to say that the lodger he spoke about is now his honorary daughter and she is his honorary dad as her own dad died a long time ago.
Just as there were prophecies about a Messiah there were also prophesies about a suffering servant such as in Isaiah 53 but until now no-one had realised that they were talking about the Messiah. No-one had connected the dots. I often feel like I’m not connecting the dots. Even in something simple like organising my diary. There have been a couple of occasions when I’ve been our doing something when I’ve had a call from Matt to say that someone I had arranged to meet had turned up at the house. I’m not sure I’d had done any better than Peter in this.
I wonder how often we miss what God is doing because we expect Him to answer our prayers in a certain way or act in a certain way. Sometimes it looks like God has forgotten us or doesn’t hear us. Everything looks like it’s unraveling and falling apart and yet God is at work. We can get so caught up in how we think things should go that we actually miss the bigger picture of what God is doing. We’ve got our mind on our own agenda and not God’s bigger agenda. We like things to go smoothly but we don’t like discomfort or suffering.
When I agreed to get involved with this church plant as part of our existing church, in my head I was going to be a small part of a big team and we would meet people face to face. I’m still waiting for the big team. Then a few months ago some of the main leadership team of our sending church had a sense that God was saying that the church as a whole should be more public. They shared the verses that say ‘you are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden’. My thoughts on that were ‘no thanks’. I’m not a particular public person, I’m quite private. And then COVID happened and lockdown and here we are with everything online. The goal is still the same but it doesn’t lookout all how I was expecting it to or how I wanted it to. Matt on the other, hand as you can probably tell, is in his element.
Jesus' response to Peter was to rebuke Him back. But not really Peter. I think Satan was using Peter to tempt Jesus to compromise or go an easier route. To try to stop Him from doing the very thing he had come to do.
I think this is quite challenging. Do we live as people trying to get God to go along with our little plans or do we live as people who ask ‘God, what are you doing and how do you want me to join in with that?’ When we’re thinking about moving to a new city for a higher paying job are we looking to the benefits for ourselves or are we asking, ‘Lord, is this what you want me to do?’. When we’re choosing someone to marry are we asking God’s opinion or do we just want him to rubber-stamp our plans.
“And He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.”
How can the poor be blessed if blessing is about stuff?
Blessing has to be about much more than just stuff. Peter, who was having this conversation with Jesus on the road, would later go on to write…
“But even if you should suffer for what is right, you are blessed. “Do not fear their threats; do not be frightened.””
What’s the problem?
Jesus didn’t just say these things WOULD happen he said MUST happen. But why must they happen? Why must Jesus die on the cross?
Peter wanted Jesus to sort out the problem out there with the world, but Jesus saw a bigger problem, The problem in here in each person’s heart. The problems out there begins in here.
On social media and in the news we see a lot of condemnation about racism and sexism and so on and rightly so. We should stand up for what is right and for justice. But I think there is sometimes another element going on under the surface. If someone says or does something that goes against society’s current moral code, everyone associated with that person is quick to condemn their actions so that everyone knows that they are not one of those bad people too. We don’t want to be tainted by the wrongdoing and the shame of someone else. We want people to know that we are ok. We are one of the good guys. It’s us, good people, against those bad people. Some people know that they miss the mark but for most of us, we like to focus on our good points.
In 2017 the BBC News website had an article about a guy called Eddie Maher. In 1993 Eddie had stolen £1.2 million pounds and then fled to the USA. He had sent his partner, Debbie on holiday to Boston a few weeks earlier with their toddler, Lee.
He only explained to her they were on the run when he met up with her again in the America. They changed their names to Stephen and Sarah and they had another son. When their first son Lee was a teenager he started getting into trouble. Eventually, he got married and when he was drunk he confessed to his wife that he thought his dad might be a fugitive. They later split up and she did some digging into the family and tipped off the police and then the whole story began to come out. What I found fascinating about the story was this. Eddie is quoted as saying, ‘My sons had a good upbringing. I taught them to be law-abiding citizens. But when Lee got to the age of being headstrong and stupid that put pressure on us. He was a problem and in the end, that's the problem that brought everything to a head.”
‘My sons had a good upbringing. I taught them to be law abiding citizens’. Do you know what, there could have been loads of things about their upbringing that was fantastic but there were a few little things that weren’t…. like their parents not being who they said they were and being on the run from the police to name just two.
The problem is out there….
It’s an extreme example but I think we can all be a bit like that. We can see the problem as being out there and not in here.
We can deny the evil in our own hearts because to admit to it would be to risk rejection, condemnation and shame. If we look at the best part of ourselves we can think we’re ok. If we take the worst parts of other people and compare them with the best parts of ourselves we come out ok. We can do really well in one area but do really badly in another. We’re created in God’s image so we’re all capable of great and wonderful things.
But if the standard is God then that is a different matter. God’s standard is perfect and He is more Holy than we can imagine. The bible says that ‘all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God’. It’s not us and them, its’ just US.
Sin breaks relationships. Firstly it breaks our relationship with God but also with other people.
I remember when our oldest child Josh, who is now 18, was small and he’d done something he shouldn’t have done and he knew he shouldn’t have done it. I can’t remember what it was now. What I do remember is that he couldn’t look me in the eye. His wrongdoing affected our relationship. And our wrong doing affects our relationship with God.
Sin wrecks our relationship with God. We become separate from Him. When are spirit is disconnected from our body our body dies. When our spirit is disconnected from God our spirit dies. We are spiritually dead.
The heart of our problem is that we are spiritually dead. Our relationship with God, the source of all life and love is broken.
Sin is more serious than we think and God is more Holy than we imagine. Because God is so Holy even the smallest sin can break our relationship with Him
Why can’t God just let us off?
So why can’t God just let us off? Well, a couple of reasons. Firstly, if he just let us off there would be no justice. We all have a deep sense of when there is an injustice against ourselves.
Even small children can sense this. The son of a friend of mine came out of school one day really upset. This was in those distant days when all the children went to school. He was upset because he and his mates had been playing and they had said some stuff and a teacher overhead them. What they had said sounded really bad but actually it was all said very innocently and without any malice. And the fact that they were wrongly accused and got into trouble was deeply upsetting. There was a real sense of injustice.
Again, I think we want justice because we’re made in God’s image and He’s a just God.
Secondly, there’s always a cost to forgiveness. When we do something wrong there is always a cost that someone has to pay? A few years ago there used to be a lot of car crime down our street. There have been all sorts from car tyres getting slashed to windows broken, cars getting keyed or stolen. When our car window was smashed someone had to pay for that to be fixed. As it turned out that person was us because the person who had done it was nowhere to be seen. Or if someone gossips about you and spreads something that’s not true, even if they come to you and say they’re sorry and you forgive them there is a cost to that. Your reputation can still be affected.
The dilemma and the answer
How can God be any less than perfect in justice but also perfect in love and mercy at the same time? The answer is through Jesus dying on the cross.
When we sinned he didn’t distance himself from us - he came to us and died the death we should have died and took our shame and condemnation on Himself so that God could show mercy and love to us, not so that we can go on living our own way but so that we could have that relationship restored and be transformed. That transformation is both instant and takes time. It’s instant in that when we repent of our sins and give our lives over to God our relationship with Him is instantly restored. It takes time in that once our relationship is restored it takes time getting to know God and his ways and letting Him transform us from inside out. How effective that depends on how much we allow him to do that.
It’s through Jesus that we can fully face up to our sin and bring it out into the light without the seriousness of it being diminished or brushed of, but also without fear of being condemned, shamed, or rejected. Jesus says to each of us, ‘your sin is bad enough that I must die to pay for it’ whilst at the same time saying you are loved enough that I don’t want you to live in shame and condemnation. This is real love where we can be totally honest about who we are (including all the bad bits) without fear of rejection.
The verse in Romans that says we have all sinned carries on like this: and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. Jesus took our place.
I’ll leave you with this quote from Tim Keller about the gospel, or good news of Jesus. He says:
The gospel is this: We are more sinful and flawed in ourselves than we ever dared believe, yet at the very same time we are more loved and accepted in Jesus Christ than we ever dared hope.
— Tim Keller