Sunday School Session 16

Hello, everyone. Welcome back to our study of the Gospel of Mark. You should, of course, be in Lecture 8.

That's where we began last week, which covers Mark chapter 14, verse 1 through chapter 15, verse 15.

You remember the telos of this section is that the Gospel writer now begins to describe and interpret the central event of our faith, the death of Jesus.

We started this the last time you were with us, and we talked about the fact that the religious leaders of the day were no friends of Jesus.

Religion is not necessarily a friend of Jesus. There's much religion out there that talks about Jesus but may not be a friend of Jesus at all, just as these religious leaders who said they loved and obeyed

God plotted to kill Jesus, though there was nothing that he did that was wrong other than upset their traditions.

You remember we talked about the woman who used that perfume to anoint

Jesus' feet as he was sitting there at a feast, and we looked at this as an extravagant expression of devotion, which should tell us, has anyone ever criticized us for loving

Jesus so much, just like the disciples did for that woman? And so we saw that the writer here is trying to impress upon us that we understand or we enter into these events with a heart of devotion.

And then we came to the narrative of the Last Supper, where Jesus radically reinterprets the

Passover, takes that Passover and all the traditions that are connected with it, and then he radically reinterprets that and shows that the

Passover is about him, that he is the Passover, that all this time, this ancient rite of the

Jewish people that celebrated their delivery from the slavery of Egypt was really something that was pointing to Jesus.

And now in the light of Jesus, we see that he is the Passover and that our communion reflects that fact, that Jesus is the

Passover. And so now we come to chapter 14, verses 27 through 31.

This is where we begin today. Now, again, let me say to you, if you haven't read the text yet, read it before you continue, because we don't have the time to read it all over again.

You read it. You can stop me when you want and read the text. Isn't that great?

You can stop me when you want. Wow. Good thing that doesn't happen on Sunday morning, huh? But you can stop me, read the text and then come back and we can look at it together.

So before we start this morning, let me pray. Father, thanks once more for the opportunity of looking at the

Lord Jesus in the Gospel of Mark. Help us now, we pray, excite our faith, increase our devotion so that we can serve him and love him better.

Thank you for this word that we have before us. Now, Lord, speak to us, we pray in Jesus name.

Amen. You would note here, what do we find in verses chapter 14, verses 27 through 31?

Jesus gives hope even in the face of failure. Jesus gives hope even in the face of failure.

Here, Jesus predicts that all his disciples are going to desert him and they protest.

Of course, they won't. They would never desert Jesus. And he flatly tells them that because the prophet

Zachariah had predicted that when he wrote that the shepherd would be struck and all the sheep would be scattered.

That was a reference to him at this very moment. And so he says, according to the scriptures, you will all desert me.

But even with this bad news, Jesus gives them reason to hope. Notice in our text that he predicts that he will rise from the dead and that he also predicts he will go ahead of them into Galilee.

Even as Jesus speaks of their failure, he does not leave them without hope.

The implication of the statement is that even though they fail him, he would see them all together again.

Even though they would be scattered, he would see them again all together.

And that just speaks to us of the grace of Jesus to us, does it not?

This is Jesus and his grace expressed towards us. But you notice what the disciples do, don't you?

Do you see what they do? They protest. They protest. They say, oh, no, we will never desert you.

Oh, no, that will never happen. Now, we're not different from the disciples, are we?

Like the disciples, we do not hear the word of grace. Instead, we hear, we concentrate on the word speaking of our failure.

And like the disciples, we will concentrate on that word of failure. It's not grace that we want, lovely and needed as it is, because grace means we're going to fail.

Grace means failure on our part. We would rather look good than admit that we are failures or that we can fall.

No, no, no, not at all. We cannot be failures. Like the disciples, we will say the same thing. No, we cannot be failures.

Instead of looking for grace, we defend ourselves or we make excuses rather than admitting our need for the grace of Christ, just like the disciples, right?

Oh, no, we'll never desert you. No, not us. Now, Peter, in his self -righteous fury, declares not only that he will not fall away, but that he will even die before that happens.

Peter protests, you see, and says, no, no, no, not me, Jesus. I'll die before I ever abandon you.

No, no one knows just how good and faithful we are, do they? And so we continue, like Peter, we continue in our delusion of strength, but all the time we need to admit our need and receive

God's grace for our failure. But Jesus goes on to destroy any illusion of strength.

He does not leave Peter alone at this point. He doesn't leave Peter alone. He doesn't leave him alone to make his bows, to protest that he will not fail.

No, no, Jesus does not leave Peter alone. And he very specifically says that Peter will disown him three times before the rooster crows.

Now, listen, this too is grace.

Someone so confident in himself must be shown his failure.

When we are so confident in ourselves, we must be shown our failure.

Only then, recognizing our complete failure, will we be in a position to receive grace.

And so Peter, in order for him to be in the position of receiving the grace of God, is now told,

Peter, you will deny me three times. You won't die for me. You're going to deny me three times.

So this is ringing in his ears later. This is going to tell him, this is grace that tells him of his utter failure.

You know what? It's interesting to me that only then, recognizing his utter failure, will he be in a position to receive grace.

And so it's fascinating to see that Peter himself, in the epistle that he will write years later, after all of this happens,

Peter himself will write and quote the scripture in his epistle of 1

Peter chapter 5, verse 5. God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

He knows that. He's going to learn it himself. Only then, when we recognize our failure, only then will we be ready to receive the grace of Christ.

And so Peter, only then, when he recognizes his utter failure, only then will he be ready to find

Jesus in Galilee and find that he lovingly, graciously receives him.

Some years ago, as I was studying through the book of Mark, I wrote this prayer.

It sums up what I've said here today. O Lord Jesus, help me to see again that you are all grace to me.

Even when you give me stinging rebukes from your word or from some other instrument, let me see your grace in it.

Thank you for that initial grace that drew me to you. Thank you for continuing grace that welcomes me after so many failures and that binds me to you.

Amen. That is my prayer. And I think that is how we must see this.

We must see Jesus as always gracious to us, always. Now we come to verse 32 through verse 42.

And here we find Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane.

Now, why did Mark include this? Or Peter, who's dictating this to Mark, why is this scene part of the story?

Why do we find Jesus agonizing in prayer before his betrayal in the garden?

Why do we see this? I believe it shows the great sorrow and horror that Jesus experienced as he anticipated the cross.

I believe it also shows how Jesus prepared for this great work.

And so I've labeled this section of Jesus' passion preparation through prayer.

Now, as you read this, it's clear Jesus felt overwhelming sorrow, overwhelming sorrow.

Torture awaits him and the wrath of the father awaits him.

Now, I do not think that Jesus looked forward to the torturous death. He was going to die on the cross.

But if we believe, if we believe that that is the main reason why he cries out to God, I think we've missed the point.

Some years ago, Mel Gibson produced a movie called

The Passion of the Christ. Remember that? Remember that? And it highlighted the terrors of physical torture.

But if we focus on that, I think we've missed the point.

Why? Why did Jesus feel such overwhelming, overwhelming and obvious sorrow?

Here's why. He was to experience the wrath of his father, with whom he had experienced nothing but perfect harmony and love.

In their relationship, in Jesus' relationship with the father and the father with his son, they both had experienced nothing but perfect harmony and love.

There was nothing that ever came between them. And now he was to drink the cup of God's wrath.

That perfect harmony, that perfect love ruptured by inexpressible and unbelievable anger.

Anger. The fury that God intended to unleash on sinners.

This was anger intended for those who despised and mocked and ridiculed and defied

God and his commandments. Perfect love disrupted by experiencing the wrath intended for those who hated

God. Now, can you imagine that? Not only, this isn't just a ripple in their relationship.

The fact of the matter is that this perfect harmony, this perfect love that they had was going to be ruptured because Jesus was going to be treated as one who despised and mocked and ridiculed and defied

God. The anger meant for those kind of people. This isn't even the kind of anger that's meant that we express to our children when they do something wrong or when we have to chastise them or discipline them.

This is the love that's supposed to be poured out on sinners who hate

God. That is what disrupts the perfect harmony and love of these two members of the

Trinity. And that is why Jesus is so overwhelmingly burdened with sorrow.

And yet Jesus drank the cup of God's wrath.

He went to the cross. He willingly drank that cup. Now, in his humanity, in his humanity, in those moments, he did not feel like going to the cross.

His emotions were so overwhelming that he didn't feel like going to the cross.

It wasn't something that he was hopping and skipping and jumping to, right? This was something that was so horrific that he was recoiled at it.

And in his humanity, his emotions just find great expression.

And so he says, Father, if there's any other way, let this hour pass from me.

If there's another way of accomplishing your purpose, let's do it that way. I don't want to experience this.

His emotions were saying no, no. But listen, his love for his father would not allow him to evade the responsibility laid on him because of his love for sinners.

How do you know that Jesus loved you? Because he did not let his feelings get in the way at the moment.

His love was so great for his people, us as sinners. His love was so great that he did not let his emotions dictate to him what he was going to do.

His love was that great. He said no to the feelings of the moment in order to accomplish this great act of love and sacrifice for us.

How do you measure your love for someone? When you love and you sacrifice even in those moments when emotion says no.

When you don't feel a particular way towards your spouse. When you don't want, when you don't feel like doing good to that guy at work who's despising you.

No, no. Instead of going with your emotions, what you do is that you still love.

You still sacrifice no matter how you feel. That's the measure of love. Jesus willingly suffered and the thought of it caused for him unbelievable agony.

And yet, and yet he went to the cross for his people.

Now the only thing that prepared him for such a task was prayer. At the end of the scene with its agony and sorrow, you see

Jesus get up, look up and say, enough. A betrayer comes.

And Jesus calmly walks into the hands of the group that have come to take him because he has communed with his father in heaven.

He has spent time in prayer. And so he confidently, fearlessly walks into the very midst of the crowd that had come to arrest him.

He had encouraged his disciples to pray so that they could face the hour of temptation, but they slapped.

And so they fled. Jesus faced the cup of God's wrath through prayer.

And that's how he walked to his death, willingly sacrificing himself to redeem us from our sin.

Well, I'm, I'm going to stop there for today. All right. I'm going to stop there for today.

And next week, we'll pick it up in chapter 14, verse 43, as we see how

Jesus willingly went to the cross, who was sovereign over, even over his own death, not caught in a technicality, not caught in a trap, but sovereignly, willingly giving his life for his sheep.

Well, let's pray, shall we? Father, again, we're thankful for how you have ministered to us through your word, help us to see

Jesus, help us to meditate on this, help us, I pray, to be like him, help us to love him, help us to serve him because of what we have seen.