Treating Jesus Like Our Lord

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You know, a lot of people talk about how it’s difficult to make the transition between childhood and adulthood because you end up in kind of this no man’s land where people don’t really know what to do with you. And some of you may remember that from your own life experience as well. My dad talks about how when he graduated from high school, he had that problem at his church at the time, that you were expected to act like an adult, but you were not listened to like an adult.

You were not allowed to participate like an adult. And I don’t know if we just had a church that was better at including youth when I got older, or if I just was so determined to be part of the church, I didn’t care, but that was not my experience. But I ran into that with high school, because I turned 18 partway through my senior year and so they would emphasize how you’re supposed to be an adult but they would work that to their advantage whichever way I remember once having a conflict with a teacher over a grade and telling the principal you know I think my my father would be very interested to come in and discuss this with oh no we’re not going to discuss this with your father you’re an adult oh so I can check my own self out for my doctor’s appointment right no oh, your parents have to call up.

Okay, do you see the disconnect here? And they would push that, you know, you’re adults now. You need to be good citizens and you need to be involved and this and that.

But when I start campaigning for my fellow seniors to vote against the incumbent in the school board election, I get made to stay after school because, you know, you’re supposed to stay in your lane. So they would work it to their advantage whether you were an adult or not. So you end up with the responsibilities.

And I think we’ve probably all gone through this, or some of you are about to go through this, where you end up with a lot of the responsibilities of adulthood, but not a lot of the trust that goes along with it yet. And so we’ve probably all been in situations like that. And Jesus was kind of in a similar situation, where not with adulthood, but with his followers, they came to the realization of who he was.

came to, and there’s still stuff they’re not going to understand about what it means that he’s Lord, but they came to the realization that he was Lord, that he was not just a human teacher, he was not just a gifted teacher, that he was actually Lord, and yet they had trouble living with the implications of what that meant. They had trouble trusting him as Lord, and that’s what we’re going to look at tonight, was the disconnect between what they believed and how they treated Jesus. And so we’re going to be in Mark chapter 8 tonight.

Mark chapter 8, you’ll see on that handout that there are, that parts of this are going to be covered in Matthew and Luke as well, but we’re going to focus in primarily on Mark, but we’ll bring some of the others in a little bit as well. Mark chapter 8, and if you would turn there with me, and once you’ve found it, if you’d stand with me as we read together from God’s Word, if you’re not able to find it or don’t have your Bible. It’ll be on the screen there for you.

But we’re going to start in Mark chapter 8, verse 22. And it says, then he came to Bethsaida and they brought a blind man to him and begged him to touch him. So he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the town.

And when he had spit on his eyes, as one does, right? And when he had spit on his eyes and put his hands on him, he asked him if he saw anything. And looking up, and he looking up said, excuse me, and he looked up and said, I see men like trees walking.

He’s saying everybody’s blurry. Then he put his hands on his eyes again and made him look up, and he was restored and saw everyone clearly. Then he sent him away to his own house, saying, Neither go into the town nor tell anyone in the town.

Now Jesus and his disciples went out to the towns of Caesarea Philippi, and on the road he asked his disciples, saying to them, Who do men say that I am? So they answered, John the Baptist, but some say Elijah, and others one of the prophets. And he said to them, But who do you say that I am?

And Peter answered and said to him, You are the Christ. Then he strictly warned them that they should tell no one about him. And he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again. He spoke this word openly.

Then Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 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. And you may be seated.

I forgot to add as well, if you’re watching us online tonight, I did post the handout to our church’s Facebook page as well. so you can pull it up there. But this passage we just read began with a story of the healing at Bethsaida that takes place in verses 22 through 26.

And that story is too important to skip, but I tried every which way this week and just could not make a full sermon out of it. Now that doesn’t mean that I can’t at some point in the future. It doesn’t mean that other guys haven’t, but I just couldn’t tonight.

So I’m going to summarize it and use it as a lead-in to the second story that we just read there about Jesus and His conversation with the disciples. This is dealing with what people put their trust in at the time for healing. You know, we’ve talked already in this series on Mark about how sometimes people would come to Jesus for healing and He would just do some kind of straightforward thing, laying His hand on them, speaking a word to them.

He would just heal them in some normal way. But there were also times that Jesus did things that seem weird to us. In particular, the instance where he stuck his fingers in the guy’s ears and then spit.

Do you remember me bringing Benjamin up on stage and making him pretend like he was deaf? And we did charades. We kind of worked out what Jesus did.

And we see that there was a reason for what Jesus did. As bizarre as it sounds on first reading, If you realize that the man was deaf and that he was mute, everything that Jesus is doing is explaining to the man what he’s about to do so he knows what’s about to happen and who to credit with the healing when it takes place. Okay, so these things will look odd to us on the surface, but Jesus has a reason for what he’s doing.

And so I’ll admit I had to dig really hard to find what the reason was for spitting on the man’s eyes. They asked Jesus to touch him. and so Jesus naturally spits on the man’s eyes but what I what I uncovered is is that people looked many people at that time looked at saliva as a kind of cure-all for its its curative properties and I’ve heard people say this kind of thing in our world today oh I got a big cut on my leg well just let the dog lick it.

No, thank you. I like my leg. I don’t want to have to have it removed, but thanks for your advice.

I’ll keep that in my back pocket there. But there are people that actually believe that. Maybe there’s something to it.

Maybe some of you are saying, no, I’ve read the studies. That’s great. You can share them with me later, but I’ve had too much experience with dogs and no, I don’t want them licking on my cuts.

But apparently they thought there was some kind of insurative property to saliva. As a matter of fact, some people, maybe not everybody, but some people even thought it was magical. It was a cure-all. Have you seen the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding from years ago?

Do you remember the dad thought you put Windex on everything? You know, you lose a limb, put Windex on it, that kind of thing. There were some people that looked at saliva that same way.

And so Jesus walks up and puts saliva on the man who’s blind, and he asks him if he can see. And the man says he sees what? Men like trees.

He says, I can make out shadows, but everything’s real blurry. Jesus is showing that this cure that they put their trust in wasn’t really as powerful as they thought it was, but there was something more powerful, and it’s at that point Jesus puts his hand. on the man’s eyes and tells him to look up and then he’s healed.

And so Jesus is letting this be a teachable moment that while they were putting their trust in all these superstitions and all these rituals and all these things, just come to the source, come to Jesus. And this was just one more miracle demonstrating who Jesus is. As we’ve gone through the book of Mark, one of the things that I’ve uncovered and shared with you is that there is this modern skeptical idea that says the view of Jesus built over time.

And so Mark has this very low human view of Jesus and John has this very high God-like view of Jesus. And it just is evidence that things built over time. And what we’ve seen is the opposite.

I mean, not that it sloped down to John, but Mark is building a case piece by piece that Jesus Christ is God. I mean, he shows Jesus’ mastery over all of these things, the physical world, the natural world, the spiritual world. And this is just one more miracle.

This is just one more brick in that wall of showing who he is. And yet there was a long history of people misunderstanding and rejecting Jesus. In spite of all of these miracles that have taken place all throughout his ministry and throughout the book of Mark, people just don’t get it.

And if you remember back to the last time that we were together discussing the book of Mark, We talked about the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Herodians. We talked about the different groups that they were and how they differed. And yet the one thing they had in common was their rejection of Jesus.

They all had their unique reasons for it, but they all rejected Jesus. And we saw this in Matthew 16 and Mark 8. And Jesus warned about the leaven, the yeast of unbelief.

He said this unbelief, not just doubt, not just questions, but this determination that I refuse to believe in spite of the evidence in front of me, in spite of all the miracles that he’s done, I still will not believe in Jesus. He warned about this unbelief and the danger that it presented to them, because if you leave it unchecked, it’s going to spread. So the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Herodians, all these elite people had misunderstood, had completely misunderstood who Jesus was, and they had rejected him.

And the crowds, we find out, don’t really understand who Jesus is either. They’ve been watching all of this stuff. They’ve been watching everything he’s done.

They’ve listened to everything he’s taught. And they still don’t understand clearly. Because when Jesus says, who do people say that I am?

As we come into the second part of the passage, who do people say that I am? Oh, the disciples are like, if you’ve ever taught little kids, and you ask a question in a little kid’s class, they all have to raise their hand and tell you a story, right? The disciples are Johnny on the spot with their answers about what does everybody out in the community say about who I am?

They say, some people say that you’re John the Baptist. Some people say you’re Elijah. Some people say you’re Jeremiah. Some people say you’re one of the prophets.

Okay. There is the prophecy about the spirit of Elijah coming back in Malachi. Other than that, I’m puzzled by all these other prophets that are mentioned because Jews don’t believe in reincarnation.

And I’m really puzzled by the whole John the Baptist thing because they have been seen in public together on multiple occasions. So I don’t know how Jesus could be John the Baptist when they were clearly, you know. But people had these wild ideas.

But what we see is it doesn’t really take any courage. It doesn’t take any conviction. It doesn’t take any commitment to say, well, here’s what everybody else says.

As a matter of fact, when somebody tells you what everybody else is saying, just tune them out. Usually means them and their wife, right? Jesus said I want to know who you say that I am so he didn’t let them weasel out of it well here’s what everybody else is saying he said who do you say that I am and his disciples rightly recognized Jesus as Lord when he asked in verse 29 who do you say that I am it doesn’t it doesn’t give us a lot of detail about the scene but I’ve always imagined this is just my imagination this part but I’ve always imagined that they stand around and they kind of look at each other like who’s going to be the first one to speak up.

You know how sometimes I will ask you all questions on Wednesday night and you kind of look at each other like is it a trick question? And I have to remind you I don’t do that. I’m not trying to stump you.

You do that to me, not the other way around. But I’ve always imagined they just kind of look at each other like I don’t want to say because I don’t want to get it wrong. And then Peter’s always the first one to jump in with both feet in his mouth.

But this time he gets it right. Peter is the one to speak up. And he says to him, you are the Christ. And then again, I wonder if they all looked around and did he just step in it?

I mean, is this, is that the right answer? But he says, you’re the Christ. Now, Mark, a lot of times gives just the bare minimal details of some stories. So Matthew expands on it a little bit.

Luke expands on it a little bit. Luke Matthew 16, 16 says, you are the Christ, the son of the living God. These are not contradictory.

These are all, I’ve told you before, and I’ve put on some of your handouts, that they didn’t quote verbatim in the ancient world. They gave you the gist of what was being said. And all of these fall under the same heading.

Now, we need to be careful that we don’t miss what they’re saying here. Because we have taken Christ to the point where we think it’s just part of his name. As a matter of fact, I was going to say a friend.

I just knew the kid in junior high. But because of the way his dad would swear when he got angry, he thought Jesus’ middle name was Howard and his last name was Christ. Because apparently his dad would shout all three names when he slammed his hand in the car door or stuff like that. I had to say, that’s not, number one, I don’t think he has a middle name.

Not that I’ve ever heard. And Christ is not his name. It’s his title.

Christos. in the Greek. And y’all forgive me, some of these Greek words I give you, I can spell them for you, but I can read and write better than I can pronounce, okay?

The okie always likes to come out when I try to give you the Greek words. But that is a title. It is the Greek equivalent of Messiah.

And Messiah means anointed one. So when he says you’re the Christ, you know, we can easily read over that and say, well, that, okay. It’s like when I ask Jojo, who are you?

And she says, I’m Carly Josephine Byrns. Okay. Doesn’t tell me much about who you are.

This is not the equivalent of that. He’s not saying, well, you’re Jesus Christ. That’s your name. When Jesus says, who do you say that I am?

Peter just spit out the phrase, you are the Messiah. You are the anointed one that God has promised for thousands of years. You are the one we’ve been looking for.

We might miss that if we just see this as a name. Now, the next thing that we need to make sure we understand is Jesus’ response to this. Now, Mark just skips to the part where he says, don’t tell anybody, which by the way, is not a denial. Some people try to treat it as a denial. Oh, Mark is presenting Jesus as saying, oh no, shh.

No, Jesus has never been shy about correcting his disciples when they’re wrong. But Jesus’ response is not, boy, have you lost your mind? His response is, yeah, let’s keep that just between us for right now.

Jesus says the same thing in the other gospels, but in between there, in the other gospels, it gives us a little bit more information. And I think part of the reason for that is that Mark was very likely the first of the gospels that was written down. And J.

Werner Wallace, who was a cold case detective and has written books about researching Christianity as a cold case detective, has talked about how they will, when a crime is reported. They will get out just the basic facts that they need about the crime that happened and the suspect they’re looking for, and their goal is to get out the most important information as quickly as they can. And he said in contrast to the other Gospels, Mark reads kind of like that, I forget what term he uses for it, but that report that they blast out right away, where the others read more like a full report from the investigating officers.

And I think that’s why Mark sometimes is a little bit sparse on the details. It’s not contradictions. It’s that Mark was getting, and you’ll read where Mark jumps around and he says immediately, and then this happened right away, and Mark is just very excitable, and he’s just eager to get out the most important details.

So Matthew fills in a gap that’s left here and records what Jesus actually said in between that. Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, Simon son of Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. So Matthew records that Jesus says, you got it right, and you didn’t just figure this out by human wisdom.

The Father, God the Father, had to reveal this truth to you. He said, this is God’s truth. And then in both accounts, he goes on to say, but let’s keep that just among us for right now.

And we’ve talked about this a little bit in mark where he tells people, don’t tell anybody what I did. And it’s not that Jesus is denying who he is. It’s that if Jesus reveals who he is too early, people are going to sweep him into power.

They’re going to put him on the throne. He’s going to end up being that, or their goal at least is going to be for him to be that political Messiah that they’re looking for. Jesus’s glory has to be revealed at just the right time so that he can end up on the cross.

And so Jesus is managing everybody’s expectations. That’s why he tells Peter, let’s keep that quiet for a moment. But he’s telling Peter, you’re right.

You’re right. When you say that I’m the Messiah, you got it. You got it.

You’re right. And so Peter and the other disciples, they’re right in recognizing him as Lord, as their master, as their savior, as the one who is in charge of them and calls the shots and is going to give them their marching orders from now on. And that’s part of what they’ve been doing here.

Somebody would go and study under a rabbi for years and years and they would refer to him as their teacher or master and they would pattern their lives after him. But this is a recognition of Jesus as Lord in all that that means in terms of being Messiah and not just their individual master. But we see later that Peter’s perspective on Jesus being Lord, it didn’t match his profession of Jesus as Lord, because immediately after Jesus commended Peter’s faith and Peter’s confession of him as Lord, Jesus turns around and begins to preach about how he’s going to fulfill the father’s plans.

That’s the very next thing that comes out of his mouth is, I am the Messiah. He’s confirming he is the Messiah and saying, here’s how I’m going to fulfill the Father’s plans. And we go into verse 31 where it says, he began to teach to 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.

So he’s here talking to them, he’s outlined the fact that he’s about to be rejected, the fact that he’s about to suffer, the fact that he’s about to be crucified, and the fact that he’s going to rise again. Verse 32 says he spoke his word openly. This means he explained to them the whole plan.

Maybe not every detail of the plan, but the plan has been laid out for them for them to understand. And yet in spite of the fact that Jesus here, you’ve just acknowledged him as the Messiah, you’ve just acknowledged him as Lord. You’ve just acknowledged him as God’s son.

You said that. And now he says, here is the plan that the father has laid out. Here is the reason that I’ve come.

Here’s what I’m going to do. And it’s all planned. And I’m letting you know about it.

Peter, in spite of those two things, looks at Jesus and says, uh-uh. No, it’s not supposed to work that way. He started to challenge Jesus in front of the other disciples.

Verse 32, Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But when he had turned around and he looked at the disciples, so that tells us Peter kind of pulled him off to the side and said, do you know what you’re saying here? But he’s doing it in full view of everybody else.

And his objection, you know, from a human standpoint, it makes sense. He loved Jesus. He cared about what happened to him.

And here Jesus is talking about being rejected and suffering and dying. And because he cared about Jesus, he didn’t want him to suffer. And that’s why Matthew records in Matthew 16, 22, him saying, far be it from you, Lord, this shall not happen to you.

Saying, Jesus, Lord, I don’t want this to happen to you. It’s not right. You shouldn’t have to suffer.

And from a human standpoint, Peter is right, isn’t he? Jesus didn’t deserve to suffer. He shouldn’t have had to go to the cross.

But there was a disconnect in his thinking here. Something’s not matching up when he acknowledges Jesus as Lord and all that that entails that he was in charge. And yet Jesus is laying out his plan and he’s assuming Jesus doesn’t know best about what should happen.

And so Jesus challenged Peter right back. Verse 33 says, he rebuked Peter saying, get behind me, Satan. You know what?

Live your life so that Jesus never has to say, get behind me, Satan. There’s a life goal for all of us. He rebuked Peter saying, get behind me, Satan, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.

So Peter here was ignoring God’s plans because he couldn’t see beyond his own thoughts and his own perspective to realize that God knew better. Because in his mind, God’s plan looked crazy. And Peter thought, I know a better way.

I know something we ought to do instead. But the get behind me Satan expression, he’s not saying that Peter has literally turned into Satan. But he’s definitely giving an indication about perspectives here because looking at things this way and operating the way Peter wants things to operate would play into Satan’s hands.

And I don’t think Satan even understood that at this point. But as I talked about this morning, where did the seed of the woman crush the serpent’s head? It was with the crucifixion and resurrection.

Where did Jesus have his ultimate victory over Satan? It was the crucifixion and the resurrection. And yet Peter wants to take all of that away because from his short-sighted human perspective, it just seems like it would be better, it would be right for Jesus not to endure the cross.

And so Jesus says you’re playing into Satan’s plans here. Because you’re not looking at this the way God does, you’re looking at it the way man does. And we look at that and we want to condemn Peter for that, and he’s wrong for his approach.

But you know, I do the exact same thing. I mean, now I have the benefit of hindsight where I can look back and say, crucifixion. Not a good Friday for Jesus, but a very good Friday for me.

You know, I’m glad that he went through with that. He shouldn’t have had to, but thank you, Lord, for doing that. That was very good.

I mean, that could not have worked out better for me. But I do this with God’s plans all the time. In my mind, I know He’s Lord.

I recognize Him as Lord. But there’s a disconnect somewhere where I read His plans or I know He’s leading me in a certain direction. And I think, but no, it would work better if this were to happen.

There are some times I have some, even yesterday, I had a little pity party with the Lord over something that I’ve been asking him to do that may, you know what? It’s either just not in his will or it’s just not in his will for right now. And I keep looking at my plans and I said, Lord, but it would be so good if you would just do this.

Lord, I’ve been asking you to do this for years. And can’t you see, Lord, that everything would just be great if it and then this domino would fall into place and that and I’m doing the exact same thing as Peter I’m wanting to acknowledge him as as Lord but then not let him fulfill that role because I think I know better now Peter’s I think the reason Peter’s incident got recorded in the gospels is because his wrong perspective threatened to undermine the very basis of our forgiveness me pressing for my own way has not been about to cost humanity as savior but I wonder how many times I have been outside of God’s will and possibly outside of God’s will stamping my foot like a petulant child because I think I know better. Yes, I know your Lord, but I’ve got this perspective that says everything would just be great if you would do what I want to do.

See, I acknowledge him as Lord, but I don’t trust him to do Lord things. And we’ve got to do both. As believers, if we acknowledge him as Lord, if we recognize that he is Lord of all, then we have to trust him to do Lord things.

We have to trust him to make Lord decisions. We have to let him be Lord. And I’m hesitant to use that language because Jesus is Lord whether I acknowledge it or not.

He’s on the throne and it’s not changing because of anybody’s vote, right? He is Lord. But I have to act in a way that is consistent with me recognizing that.

I have to get out of the way and not try to take that from him. Not that I ever could. But if we recognize Jesus as Lord, we need to respect Him as Lord.

If we acknowledge that He’s got that role, we need to let Him do the things that come with that role, and we need to be okay with it.