A sermon for Princeton First United Methodist Church, September 13, 2015…

Mark 8:27-38

I was standing outside the “Princess Playhouse,” the local community theater in Mt. Hope. I was waiting on others to arrive for the rehearsal scheduled that afternoon and evening. I was thirteen or fourteen at the time and really didn’t expect much to be happening on the streets while I waited.

To kill time, I decided to look over the copies of the playbills that were displayed on the walls outside the entrance to the Princess. I read one from ten years before and then started to look at the playbill for the production of Count Dracula we had performed the previous Fall.

In the midst of my reading and daydreaming I suddenly heard a loud voice behind me say, “Friend, do you know Jesus?”

I’m not sure if the two young men who had snuck up behind me thought they would get extra points for sending a teenager straight to heaven by scaring him to death or if they thought this was a particularly effective evangelistic approach. I can tell you from experience, however, that they were much closer to succeeding on the former than they were ever going to get on the latter with me.

After composing myself I turned around and gave them my best United Methodist Youth smile and said, “Why yes. Of course I know Jesus. I go to the United Methodist Church just over the hill there.”

“Well,” the young man who had not scared me said, “you may have learned about Jesus in Sunday School but do you know him?”

The other joined in as he opened a Bible he was carrying, “The Bible tells us that all have fallen short of the glory of God.” He let me glance at the moving Bible page. “And it tells us that Jesus came into this world to save us from our sins but we have to accept him in our heart and confess him with our lips.” He flipped through a couple of bookmarks he had in the Bible and let me see the words blur by my eyes.

“So,” the second one asked again, “do you know Jesus well enough that if you stepped off that curb and got hit by a car that you would be assured that you went to heaven?”

I just blinked at them a couple of times and said, “Yes. I do.” And I turned around and kept reading.

I heard their feet shuffle a few times and then finally one of them said, “We will be praying for you, brother.” Thankfully, he said this as they were leaving.

This text we just read from Mark’s gospel is one about some people who definitely “knew” Jesus. At least, it is about those people who were closest to him, who shared their lives with him, who witnessed the work that he did and gave up all they had to follow him.

In a conversation with them as they are walking along some road Jesus asks them, “Who do the people say that I am?”

I’m sure that those who knew Jesus so well wanted to show that they were paying attention to the crowds around him and they offered the many answers that they heard.

I imagine that there was bit of silence – not really silence but more of just the sounds of people walking for a few minutes while those answered hung in the air – before Jesus asked his second question, “Yes, but who do you say that I am.”

I can almost hear the gravel sliding as Peter comes to an abrupt halt on the roadway and answers Jesus, “You are the Messiah.”

The whole group stopped when Peter said this – at least in the way that I see it happening – and Jesus kinda nods and then does something rather odd. He sternly orders them – not asks them nicely, not laughingly tells them – but sternly orders them to tell no one about him.

There is another account of this conversation in another Gospel that tells us a bit more about Jesus’ response to Peter but that didn’t matter much to Mark. At least not enough for him to include it in his account, so we will go with Peter’s answer that he knew Jesus well enough to profess him as Messiah and Jesus sternly orders the whole group not to tell anyone about him.

A rather odd way to get a movement going, don’t you think? Don’t tell anyone about it.

Scholars have used gallons of ink and preachers like me have thrown around millions of words about this whole idea of Jesus telling the disciples to be quiet about who he is. I have been and obviously am going to be another one of those participants today.

I think the key to understanding why Jesus said this is in the several verses that follow this warning. The ones where Jesus explains exactly what being the Messiah meant to him. The ones where Peter tries to treat Jesus like a child and scolds him about saying such things. The ones where Jesus calls Peter Satan for just thinking about himself and human things rather than the heavenly, kingdom things. You hear it also as Jesus says to the disciples, “If you want to follow me, deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me.”

Deny yourself – means setting aside your own agenda. Take up the cross means that we acknowledge when we are following Jesus things are not going to be so clear and easy, they are going to be messy. Things are going to get rough.

It is clear from these words that follow Jesus’ order to the disciples to not talk about who he was that Jesus was worried that maybe disciples have a hard time figuring out how to explain Jesus and they do much better when they just follow Jesus.

In other words, for disciples then and now, this lesson from Mark is telling us that our profession of faith must never be one in which we take possession of Jesus – instead, our profession is to possess the cross. We are to give up our own agendas, our own thoughts of what God should be and let Jesus be the leader, no matter what.

Peter and the rest of the first disciples had a difficult time with that way of living. Jesus knew it and thought it best to tell them to be quiet.

Disciples today? Well, I think if we are honest, it is still a struggle sometimes.

The pastor was happy to announce to the small country church that an anonymous donor had given a gift to the church in order for the Trustees to outfit the church with chandeliers. The Trustees would hold a meeting later that afternoon to decide whether to accept the gift or return it to the donor.

The meeting time came and people who felt both ways about the gift came ready to fight.

“If God had intended for chandeliers to be in this church, we would have had them a long, long time ago,” said one side.

“God means for us to have these chandeliers, or else he wouldn’t have put it on the heart of someone to donate them,” said another side.

The arguments went on and on. Neither side willing to budge even after an hour or so of debate. The resorted to name calling. They resorted to questioning the faith of one another, the donor and the pastor. The arguments went on till it began to get dark outside and darker inside.

Finally, the one person who hadn’t said a word throughout all the meeting cleared his throat and said, “Folks, I don’t know much about chandeliers – don’t know nothing about them actually, but I will tell you this. What this church needs is some light!”

Sometimes, the church does need some light. Especially when they fight with each other over earthly things rather than focus on the heavenly, kingdom things of being one in Christ.

Over the past several weeks, many of us have witnessed a battle which has caused mind-numbing damage to Christianity. The battle took place in a circuit clerk’s office and in courtrooms in Kentucky as well as in front of the watchful eye of the entire world.

First of all, I know that many people have feelings about whether Kim Davis should issue marriage licenses or not. Many people have strong feelings about the whole same sex marriage issue that has risen to the forefront of our society. Our church has been engaged in conversations about sexuality and faith for almost my entire life – and people feel very strongly about things one way or another.

Second, I have restrained from saying anything about this latest battle because I know how easily it is to be misunderstood when someone already disagrees with me. It is hard to speak when we don’t know if anyone is really listening. I know it is equally difficult to listen when I don’t like what someone is saying to me.

However, regardless of how we feel about same sex marriage and the battle continuing in Kentucky, I hope and pray that we can all see why sometimes Jesus tells us to just keep our mouths shut when it comes to telling people who we think he is.

On the same sex marriage side of these demonstrations, I have heard people completely disown their brothers and sisters in Christ who choose to act differently than they would in these circumstances. I have heard vitriolic, hurtful name calling. I have seen hate filled signs from the side of this argument that starts their position by saying “Jesus loves all sinners.”

AND, on the side of Kim Davis and her supporters, I have heard people completely disown their brothers and sisters in Christ who choose to act differently than they would in these circumstances. I have heard vitriolic, hurtful name calling. I have seen hate filled signs from the very people in this argument who say Jesus is their Savior and Lord.

You see, the saddest part of all this is that both sides lay claim to Jesus as Messiah. And they do so loudly, so all the world can hear.

Is it any wonder that sometimes, sometimes, Jesus just looks at the disciples and sternly tells them not to tell anyone who they think he is.

The only one winning in this battle in Kentucky is Satan, because all of us Christians just can’t seem to keep from dragging Jesus into our battles.

A person I follow on Twitter, an author named Doug Bursh, made this comment this week: “I think we might need fewer reformers and more repenters. Perpetually pointing out the sins of others makes us annoying.”

I believe we have seen Christianity take a mind-numbing blow in the hearts and minds of many people who have not yet met Jesus. And it is going to hurt us all in the long run.

Our profession of faith must never be one in which we take possession of Jesus. Instead, our profession is to possess a cross and help one another carry it when necessary.