Day 8: The Resurrection

A Mournful and dejected Mary Magdalene and her cohort have made their way to Jesus’ tomb to embalm his body, but rather than find the broken body of their spiritual leader they are greeted by an angel and the most significant statement that may ever have been uttered:

Mark 16:6:

“”Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen!‘”

Shortly after, we find Jesus back with the disciples, instructing them on what the resurrection means. After encouraging them to have more faith, he lays out a blueprint of how they are to live their lives in the knowledge that, as Jospeh of Arimathea had longed for, the Kingdom of God was now very present here on earth. Jesus’ vanquishing of the grave meant heaven had very much invaded the here and now. Here’s what Jesus said:

Mark 16:15-18:

“He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”“

Jesus commissioned the disciples to go and live radical, kingdom centered lives. They were to preach the gospel, that Jesus died for sins and was resurrected to bring eternal life, and they were to display the power that that released. The disciples were no longer confined to living by the world’s rules – they were to live on earth as it is in heaven. And so they did…

Mark 18:20:

“Then the disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them and confirmed his word by the signs that accompanied it.“

Let us have the same confidence in the significance of the Easter story as did those first believers. Let us live every day in the full knowledge of the resurrection power of Jesus. And let us know that God is longing to reveal that power and confirm all that has been claimed about him in his word. It would be a waste to do otherwise.

Holy Week is more than a story – so go live it.

Happy Easter!

RP

Day 7: The Burial of Jesus

Obviously Holy Week is all about Jesus, but there’s another guy who’s definitely worth thinking about too – Joseph of Arimathea.

Let’s pick up the story immediately after Jesus has died.

Mark 15:42-47. The Burial of Jesus:

“It was Preparation Day (that is, the day before the Sabbath). So as evening approached, Joseph of Arimathea, a prominent member of the Council, who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God, went boldly to Pilate and asked for Jesus’ body. Pilate was surprised to hear that he was already dead. Summoning the centurion, he asked him if Jesus had already died. When he learned from the centurion that it was so, he gave the body to Joseph. So Joseph bought some linen cloth, took down the body, wrapped it in the linen, and placed it in a tomb cut out of rock. Then he rolled a stone against the entrance of the tomb. Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses saw where he was laid.“

Jesus has breathed his last on the cross, and his body was about to go the same way as all the other convicted criminals who suffered the wrath of Rome’s corporal punishment – the rubbish dump. But we have an intervention, and from an unlikely source. As a member of the Jewish Council that had pressed so vehemently for Jesus’ execution, Joseph of Arimathea was probably way down the list of people expected to ensure Jesus was afforded some honour in his burial.

Check out verse 43: “Joseph of Arimathea, a prominent member of the Council, who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God, went boldly to Pilate and asked for Jesus’ body.”

Let’s start from the end of that verse and work backwards.

First, Joseph is bold. We can all learn from that. If there’s something we think needs to happen we should do whatever needs doing to make it so, even if that means stepping out and taking a risk.

Second, Joseph was described as “himself waiting for the Kingdom of God”. This is such a cool statement, I’d love someone to say that about me. Waiting implies expectation – so we can infer that Joseph was someone who expected God’s kingdom to invade earth. The fact that this is mentioned in conjunction with his act of honour towards Jesus shows that Joseph believed that expectation to have been set in motion by the man from Nazareth.  I love Joseph’s faith too. he didn’t know that Jesus was going to rise but he still held to both his expectation of the Kingdom and also his conviction that Jesus was part of it. Joseph was both hungry for and sensitive to God’s presence on earth; surely two of the most praiseworthy of things.

Third, Joseph wasn’t just a member of the council, he was a “prominent” member. There was a lot on the line for Joseph. By nailing his colours to Jesus’ mast he was putting any kind of socio-religious standing that he had firmly on the line. He was prepared to risk reputation to remain true to what he believed in. We could learn a lot in terms of recognising the significance of Jesus’ death in our own lives, whatever the cost.

Joseph of Arimathea: believer, activist, legend.

RP

Day 6: The Crucifixion

For the sixth day of Holy Week I have read Mark 15:1 – 41 and am going to look at the ‘Coronation’ of Jesus, which is something that is highlighted by Shane Claiborne in his book ‘Jesus for President’ (a book that is well worth reading in its entirety!). He looks at the powerful way that Jesus’ procession to the cross is contrasted with Caesar’s coronation and procession, and how significant it must have been to the early readers of the Gospel.

Coronation and Procession (8 steps)

1. Caesar: The Praetorian guard (six thousand soldiers) gathered in the Praetorium. The would-be Caesar was brought into the middle of the gathering.

1. Jesus: Jesus was brought to the Praetorium in Jerusalem. And the whole company of soldiers (at least two hundred) gathered there.

2. Caesar: A purple robe was placed on the candidate. They were also given an olive-leaf wreath made of gold and a sceptre for the authority of Rome.

2. Jesus: Soldiers brought Jesus a wreath (of thorns), a sceptre (an old stick), and a purple robe.

3. Caesar: Caesar was loudly acclaimed as triumphant by the Praetorian Guard.

3. Jesus: Sarcastically, the soldiers acclaimed, mocked, and paid homage to Jesus.

4. Caesar: A procession through the streets began. Caesar walked with a sacrificial bull and a slave with an axe to kill the bull behind him.

4. Jesus: The procession began. But instead of a bull the would-be king and god became the sacrifice and Simon of Cyrene was to carry the cross.

5. Caesar: The procession moved to the highest hill in Rome, the Capitolene hill (‘head hill’).

5. Jesus: Jesus was led up to Golgotha (in Aramaic ‘head hill’).

6. Caesar: The candidate stood before the temple altar and was offered a bowl of wine mixed with myrrh, which he was to refuse. The wine was then poured onto the bull and the bull was then killed.

6. Jesus: He was offered wine, and he refused. Right after, it is written, “And they crucified him.”

7. Caesar: The Caesar-to-be gathered his second in command on his right hand and his third on his left.

7. Jesus: Next came the account of those being crucified on his right and left.

8. Caesar: The crowd acclaimed the inaugurated emperor. And for the divine seal of approval, the gods would send signs, such as a flock of doves or a solar eclipse.

8. Jesus: He was again acclaimed (mocked) and a divine sign confirmed God’s presence (the temple curtain ripped in two). Finally, the Roman guard, who undoubtedly pledged allegiance to Caesar, the other ‘Son of God’, was converted and acclaimed this man as the Son of God.

This extraordinary symbolism would have been unmistakable to the first readers of the Gospel. The crown of thorns, the purple robe, the royal staff; the whole section leading up to the crucifixion reads like the coronation of Jesus! At the apex of this passage is the Roman Centurion’s exclamation that “Surely this man was the Son of God!” He saw how Jesus died and became the first evangelist. His realisation tears apart his whole view of the world and reveals the fallacy of earthly empire and the nature of the true King.

Mark is trying to show us where our allegiance should lie. At the foot of the cross, when even those that Jesus loved must have been bewildered (only failed Messiahs hung on crosses), a Roman Centurion proclaimed that Jesus was the Son of God! The journey to the cross was the final coronation of the Son of God, the rightful King, who in the cross defeated sin and death.

JB

Day 5b: The Garden of Gethsemane

Things are really starting to intensify now. It’s the night of passover, Jesus has just shared the Last Supper with his disciples and now we find him in the Garden of Gethsemane, preparing himself for the events that the next twelve hours or so will bring.

You can find the passage for this story in Mark, but I wanted to use this space to look at the prayer that Jesus prayed for us, those would come after the disciples. So we’re heading for John 17 instead.

John 17:20-26. Jesus Prays for All Believers:

““My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world. “Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”“

It’s astonishing that Jesus, hours from horrific death, would be so adherent to the path laid out for him that even if this time of great peril, anguish and grief he was still able to remember why he was doing it all and pray for those who would benefit. That’s us. Us! Jesus prayed for you and for me.

What did he pray? Well first and foremost he prayed that we would be one. Jesus’ greatest desire for his followers was that they would be united. He recognised that if the world was to believe their message, and so bring glory to God, Christians would need to live and act as they actually are – one big family. In fact, the litmus test of whether Jesus actually was sent by God would be whether or not we could do that: be one. For if the church can’t come to a consensus on Jesus, how will anybody else? Quite the responsibility I’d say.

And Jesus wasn’t alone in holding unity in such high regard. Check out Ephesians 4 or Psalm 133 for starters.

There is so much to say about unity but I’ll stick with sharing with you a word I heard in a sermon by Danny Silk called Putting off the Accuser. Here’s what I got from it:

Apparently the root of the greek word for ‘accuser’ (one of Satan’s names) is the same root from which we derive our word ‘category’. Setting up categories is something that people love to do, we love to put labels on ourselves and on each other. We might say things like, ‘They’re a Charismatic’, or ‘I’m a Calvinist’ or even ‘He’s pro-choice’. Even the Corinthians did it, remember the whole ‘I am of Paul/Apollos/Peter/Jesus’ episode?

The problem is that this fosters division. We separate ourselves from each other by rallying around particular positions, whether they be theological, political, stylistic, whatever. And where there are divisions, where there are categories, there too is accusation. We start to choose who we align ourselves with and who we disassociate with – we judge other people by their categories and often put a condition on whether or not we can actually call them ‘brother’ or ‘sister’.We give Satan room to come in and exploit these divisions, usually with catastrophic effect.

The body of Christ is a diverse group, and praise God that it is so! But even though we will never be uniform we must remember to treasure unity so highly that we are prepared to humble ourselves and love and accept each other, regardless of any categories that we’ve allowed to exist. God doesn’t do categories, he does family. The problem is that it costs us something, and more often than not we’re not prepared to pay.

Jesus cherished unity so much that it was on his mind even in his darkest hour. It should hold the same value for us.

Mark 3:25:

“If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand“

RP

Day 5a: The Last Supper

Day 5 in the sequence of Holy Week includes everything from The Last Supper through to Jesus’ arrest but I have been looking specifically at The Last Supper.

It was the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the day on which the Jews were to sacrifice the Passover lamb to remember their deliverance from slavery, when Jesus’ disciples asked him where they were to go and make preparations for the Passover. They probably thought that theirs was a relatively simple question but Jesus answers by giving them a specific person to find who will lead them to a specific room!

Mark 14:13 – 16

So he sent two of his disciples, telling them, ‘Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him. Say to the owner of the house he enters, “The Teacher asks: where is my guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?” ‘He will show you a large room upstairs, furnished and ready. Make preparations for us there.’

The disciples left, went into the city and found things just as Jesus had told them.

The disciples didn’t question him but simply went and found that things were just as Jesus had said. It struck me that we should be openly asking God about his will for even the smallest things! We should always be praying,

‘Your Kingdom come, your will be done‘

with the expectation that He will make his will known to us. We should be trusting in God for all things, even things as seemingly trivial as where to eat, and be constantly open to His purpose in all that we do.

One other small thing that struck from reading Mark’s account of The Last Supper was the way in which Jesus was modelling community with his disciples. Meal times, especially at Passover, were a time to be spent in community. Jesus talks to the disciples about some pretty important things ‘While they were reclining at the table eating’. After Jesus had broken bread and given his disciples wine there is a verse that may at first seem unremarkable but which I think is a further illustration of community.

Mark 14:26

When they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.

After the meal they sang together. They were living out community.

Mark decided it was worth a mention. I bet Jesus had a great voice.

JB

Day 4: Jesus Anointed at Bethany

Mark 14:3-9:

“While he was in Bethany, reclining at the table in the home of a man known as Simon the Leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on his head.

Some of those present were saying indignantly to one another, “Why this waste of perfume? It could have been sold for more than a year’s wages and the money given to the poor.” And they rebuked her harshly.

“Leave her alone,” said Jesus. “Why are you bothering her? She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, and you can help them any time you want. But you will not always have me. She did what she could. She poured perfume on my body beforehand to prepare for my burial. I tell you the truth, wherever the gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.”“

I imagine most of us have heard this passage many many times before. That in itself gives us a certain air of confidence towards the story on account of Jesus’ declaration in verse 9 that the woman’s deeds would be remembered wherever the Gospel would be preached. They certainly have been!

Joel wrote yesterday about having the right perspective on life and possessions; that ultimately everything, ourselves included, belongs to God. The woman in Mark 14 certainly had that view. Whereas we might look at the situation the same way as the disciples and see a ‘valuable’ resource being seemingly wasted, the woman saw an opportunity to be extravagant in her devotion to Jesus and grabbed it.

Even though Jesus made it pretty clear who was in the right, we still look at the story with a tinge of regret, don’t we? It was a lot of money. It still offends us a little bit. So much so that if we saw the very same thing happening today we would most likely maintain a harsh, scolding position.

But we shouldn’t, and in fact we mustn’t. Where there is an opportunity be be extravagant in our worship, we must take it – we should even pursue those times. God loves our passion; our complete abandon of ourselves to him.

Take King Jehoash for example in 1 Kings 13:18-19:
“Then he said, “Take the arrows,” and the king took them. Elisha told him, “Strike the ground.” He struck it three times and stopped. 19 The man of God was angry with him and said, “You should have struck the ground five or six times; then you would have defeated Aram and completely destroyed it. But now you will defeat it only three times.”“

Had Jehoash had more passion, more extravagance, more disregard for himself, he would have known greater victory in his life.

The turning point is what you value. Jesus was so significant to the woman in Mark 14 that she was prepared to spend anything on him, no matter the cost. And if, then, the episode was so important to Jesus, this leaves us with two necessary responses:

1. We need to be so intimate with Jesus that we have that same level of devotion and adoration.
2. We must be prepared to show that in whatever way seems right.

The question that follows then….what do you have that you can pour at Jesus’ feet?

RP

Day 3: Paying Taxes

On Day 3 I looked at all of Jesus’ teaching between the clearing of the Temple and His being anointed at Bethany. There is a lot of great and important teaching in this section (roughly Mark 11:27 to 13:37) but I have chosen one piece that stood out to me.

Jesus and his disciples are in Jerusalem for the Passover festival and Jesus has come to the Temple courts where he begins to be questioned by the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders. They question his authority and he speaks to them in parables. Later the chief priests, teachers of the law and the elders send some of the Pharisees and Herodians to try and trap Jesus by forcing him to incite insubordination, and therefore be arrested, or be seen supporting the military Roman occupation of Israel.

Jesus knew of their hypocrisy and responds in what can only be described as an unexpected and amazing way; he asks for them to bring him a coin.

It’s interesting to note that Jesus didn’t have any currency of his own on him!

He asks whose portrait and inscription is on the coin and they reply that it is Caesars.

Mark 12:17

“Then Jesus said to them, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.” And they were amazed at him.“

He stuns them by going above and beyond their trap and forcing the Pharisees and Herodians to ponder, “What is Caesar’s? And what is God’s?” Caesar may lay claim to the territory of Israel and may demand taxes from it’s people but God is sovereign over all creation. Caesar’s occupation is temporary and insignificant compared to God’s eternal reign. Is not Caesar himself God’s?

Mark even mentions that they were amazed at what he had said, he surprised them and forced them to think differently about the world. This highlights for us the significance of what Jesus was saying and how important it is to take it to heart and adjust our mindset. We get so caught up in ownership and possession of things which ultimately blind us to the glory of God’s creation and the reality that while authorities and powers of the world may have claims on us, ultimately we ourselves are God’s.

JB

Day 2: Jesus Clears The Temple

Mark’s Gospel is 16 chapters long; 6 of them concentrate on the week leading up to Jesus’ resurrection. The evangelist obviously wanted us to take note of something.

Here we are on Day 2. Jesus has just entered Jerusalem on a donkey to a triumphant reception – the people were honouring him as “the one who comes in the name of the Lord”. That was a good day for Jesus. His next major activity was to head straight for the Temple and put a stop to the trading that was going on there:

Mark 11:15-18:

“When they arrived back in Jerusalem, Jesus entered the Temple and began to drive out the people buying and selling animals for sacrifices. he knocked over the tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves, and he stopped everyone from using the Temple as a marketplace. He said to them, “The Scriptures declare, ‘My Temple will be called a house of prayer for all nations,’ but you have turned it into a den of thieves.” When the leading priests and teachers of religious law heard what Jesus had done, they began planning how to kill him. But they were afraid of him because the people were so amazed at his teaching.“

That is the chunk of Mark that people would quote if asked to regale the story of Jesus clearing the temple. However, the story actually starts four verses before this, literally just after Jesus had entered the city the previous evening:

Mark 11:11:

“So Jesus came to Jerusalem and went into the Temple. After looking around carefully at everything, he left because it was late in the afternoon. Then he returned to Bethany with the twelve disciples.“

What I love about this whole “turning tables” episode is that Jesus didn’t just find himself in the Temple one day and then react out of the indignation that he felt. No, verse 11 says that Jesus had already been there and had been “looking around carefully at everything.” His actions were very much considered. As he entered the Temple to find the merchants the next day, he knew exactly what he was going to be doing.

So how does that change things? Maybe not that much. I guess, for me, it just makes the whole lesson of verses 15-18 that much more pertinent as Jesus was obviously being very deliberate in his actions.

What then is that lesson? It could be many things: be honest in your dealings; don’t sell things inside of church; it’s good to have ‘righteous anger’; take an active stance against injustice. All good stuff.

But I read the passage as Jesus coming against those who try and broker salvation. Notice the ‘produce’ in question: animals for sacrifice and doves – i.e. those things that Jews would use in the passover celebration as a reminder that God had chosen not to punish Israel along with evil in the land (Egypt). And people were selling them. For profit. In the Temple.

The grace that God had extended to his people was being extorted to them in his own front garden. ‘Not cool’ would be an understatement.

So, then, we have to be careful not to fall into the same trap; not to broker grace to one another. Namely, “you can only be a Christian if you do/say/think this or that” (aside from the whole trusting in Jesus part of course – that’s non-negotiable!). Membership in God’s family comes on his terms, not ours. Let’s make sure we don’t defame that by having the audacity to create hoops for people to jump through in order get the ‘all-clear’ from us; hoops designed to benefit us or make us feel better about ourselves; hoops designed purely to control. Salvation isn’t a business that we can make a profit from. Jesus hates it when we think like that. Actively.

Grace is a free gift from God – don’t try and sell it on.

RP

Student Blog Does Holy Week

It’s Easter (a.k.a. Holy) week, hurrah! And we have a special treat for you. Every day until Sunday we’re going to be taking you through the story of Jesus’ last week before his crucifixion and resurrection. Joel and I will be looking at some passages involved and sharing some of our thoughts on them. It promises to be amazing.

Day 1 was actually yesterday, the triumphal entry. So we’re starting today with Day 2: Jesus clearing the temple. Come back in a few hours to read it! (We’re just about to head off for lunch you see…) And make sure you check back everyday after that for your fresh slice of Easter goodness. Our hope is that it will help you to spend some time each day focusing on God and getting a fresh perspective on a story that we could potentially have let ourselves become over-familiar with.

Enjoy