A Call to Die – Mark’s Gospel and Me

Tonight we’re going to wrap up Mark’s gospel at our study group. We finished going through the text last week and this week we want to draw out some of the big ideas so that they stick in the minds of those in the group for future readings of Mark. It’s a fascinating ride starting as Mark develops a picture of the Messiah king in the chapters leading up to 8:29 and Peter’s great confession. Then he turns the narrative a bit to show us a second identity to which Jesus claims fulfillment – that of the Suffering Servant. Leading up to the cross and including the cross narrative the text is absolutely littered with references to Isaiah and not only to the traditional ‘servant songs’ but also to numerous passages dealing with both judgment of Israel and the restoration of Israel which also marks the occasion when the gentiles will come streaming in. Its a masterful narrative that in one sense is fairly simple to understand, so much so that some have often summarized Mark’s gospel to teach ‘who Jesus is and what he came to do’. Yet it also has so much depth and will keep you wondering for days as to why Mark chose to arrange the material the way he did. Its a gospel that calls for deep reflection and life evaluation.

As a Christian reader of Mark’s gospel, as one who has acknowledged the atonement to which the narrative points I was really overwhelmed by one giant challenge that Mark throws at those who would follow Christ – the call to die to self, to take up ones cross daily (8:34-36). If there is one application the Christian community needs to grab hold of it is that – we, as those having been cleansed by the atonement, are called by God himself to die to our own wants, needs, desires, motives, attitudes and passions and live for the wants, needs, desires, motives, attitudes and passions of Christ, which means crucifixion every single day. It’s a hard call and without the atonement it would be an impossible call to even attempt to respond to. However, in light of God’s mercy we must respond – we must die.

Who are the ‘Poor’?

I spent the day doing some work on Isaiah 61:1-3. This short text is full of great gems of insight into the promise of the Gospel which comes through the Servant/Messiah, ultimately fulfilled in Jesus Christ. After all the passage is most famous because it is quoted by Jesus in Luke 4:18-19 where Jesus directly identifies himself as that Servant/Messiah. One of the issues surrounding the passage revolves around the exact meaning of the term ‘poor’ in verse one – just how narrow or broad is the term being used. Well John Oswalt, an accomplished commentator writes the following:

‘The connotation of this term is not restricted to financial or material conditions. Nor is there any justification in the context for limiting the reference to an oppressed minority of righteous persons. Rather, it speaks of all who are distressed and in trouble for any reason, including sin.’ (The Book of Isaiah – chapters 40-66, NICOT, p. 565)

I think there’s a word of caution here for us as we operate within a younger evangelicalism that is horrified at the neglect of the poor (in the narrow sense) by previous generations of evangelicals and so is busy reconstructing a theology to address the problem.  Let’s make sure we use the texts in such a way that we bring out the full meaning of terms and not just the narrow sense in order to support our personal battles – even if those battles are good and right in and of themselves.

To Know or Not to Know?

Do we know through doing or do we do through knowing? This is a paradigm that the Emerging Church (EC) seems to be struggling with. They’re disillusioned by all the ‘God-knowers’ who just seem to have no out working in their lives of the mission of God (and they should be deeply disturbed by this fact). So they begin asking the question ‘do we know things about God first and then begin doing? OR is it perhaps possible that through doing we begin to really know God?’ From just a general reading of EC literature you might begin to pick up that for some this shift has already taken place where knowing no longer constitutes primarily gaining knowledge but the emphasis has shifted significantly to doing in order to know. Now upfront I want to affirm that knowledge of God is much more than merely gaining intellectual knowledge about him, yet at the same time I’m disturbed that gaining intellectual knowledge is becoming highly unpopular.

My reading of the Bible seems to be saying to me that first and foremost we need to come to a recognition and understanding of God’s revelation and respond appropriately. I’ve been reading through the book of Isaiah and I’ve become extremely aware of how many times God makes statements like this:

‘…this is a people without understanding so their Maker has no compassion on them, and their Creator shows them no favor’ (Isa 27:11b)

There’s always direct relation then between this lack of understanding and the moral decay of the people being judged. The New Testament continues this idea in places like 1 Thess. 4:5, 2 Thess. 1:8 and Titus 1:16. And yes, there is an experiential side to this knowledge which is worked out as one ‘does’, but that doesn’t do away with the fact that people must gain this knowledge first. So you come to a passage like 1 John 4:8 that says we don’t love because we don’t know God and God is love. Why don’t we ‘do’? Well because we do not ‘know’.

The EC should react against intellectual knowledge about God that never translates into intimate and experiential knowledge of God, but it should be careful about how it frames the whole concept of knowing God. We don’t know God simply by going out and doing a whole lot of social work – we know God through revelation. Going out on the basis of revelation and then doing social work can greatly enhance and add experiential depth to that knowledge, but in and of itself it does not constitute the necessary knowledge.

We need to be God-knowers, proceeding from revelation into all of life.

How We See it – 3 Views

“Come now let us reason together,” says the LORD. – Isaiah 1:18a (NIV)

Three Interprestations of this verse follow:

Calvinist – God is saying ‘be reasonable and see it my way!’

Arminian – God is saying ‘let’s reason together so that BOTH of us contribute to this issue.’

Emergent – God is saying ‘ let’s go to Starbucks and talk over coffee.’

Where to be Found

I read Isaiah chapters 1 – 5 this morning and after seeing God’s condemnation of Israel, the people he had carefully nurtured from day one who rejected and maligned his word, I was left with the need to pray to God a very simple little prayer – and it went like this:

“Lord please let me be found amongst the righteous when you return.”

Gentiles and Judgment

In Mark 10:33-34 Jesus predicts his death. Up to this point though in the narrative of Mark he hasn’t mentioned that the Gentiles are going to ‘mock him and spit on him’ and ultimately kill him. The mocking and spitting seems to be drawing on Isaiah 50:6 and it seems that Jesus is marrying the two concepts of ‘Son of Man’ and ‘Suffering Servant’ (something I think that NT Wright fails to do in his overarching view of atonement, the christus victor view – but that’s another blog post altogether).

What I’m interested in though is the specific mention of the Gentiles – why the mention? My initial thoughts are that in the Old Testament Israel’s rebellion and sin was punished by the historical invasions of Gentile nations. I wonder if Mark wants us to pick up on this? Previously in redemptive history Gentiles were used by God to punish sin. Is it not a hint in the text of Mark that Jesus is going to the cross so that sin might be punished and so we have this mention of Gentiles who will, in the langauge of Isaiah, mock and kill the suffering servant? (Has anyone read Peter Bolt’s book The Cross from a Distance – does he pick up on this in that book?)

Laying Aside Pretensions

“…as it is clear from ch. 6, his (Isaiah) whole pattern of thought has been affected by the tremendous contrast between the greatness of God and the corruption of humanity. But caught up with this contrast is the amazing paradox that if humanity will lay aside its pretensions to deity, the true God will raise us to fellowship with himself (57:15). These two thoughts form the heart of the book’s theology” p.31

John Oswalt on the theology of Isaiah (The Book of Isaiah Chapters 1-39 NICOT)

False Justice

I was very challenged by a sermon i heard by John Woodhouse on Isaiah 9:8-10:4. Looking at chapter 10:1-4 in particular one sees the consequences of godless living and the effects of rejecting God.

And he suggests that in society those most likely to approve unjust policies are those who are most rich or secure in society and those which the unjust policies benefit -those living godless lives. As in Isaiah Israel sees nothing wrong with laws and policies that are detrimental to the poor.

And so i wonder if this is similar in our society amoungst ourselves, as John Woodhouse puts it;

“What concept of justice are we appealing to?”
“What are the values we express in the way we debate issues of public intrest?”
“Do the laws and policies we approve of have anything to do with the fact that we are rich and secure in our wealth and therefore find certain laws and policies attractive?”
“Whether preserving our own lifestyle is more important to us than improving that of others?”
“And whether our rights (or those we trust our constitution has given us) take precedent in our thinking over others needs?”

I wonder whether our thinking of justice is sometimes like that of the godless Israel we see in Isaiah 9 and 10.

A Light to the Nations in the Old Testament – A Riddle

I think we’re all aware of the notion that nation of Israel were supposed to be a light to the nations (cf. Isaiah 60:3). That concept comes from the prophet Isaiah, maybe about 6th century BC. Most of Israel’s history has already taken place by now. So here’s my question:

How would you defend this notion of Israel being a light to the nations from passages earlier than Isaiah’s writings? Put your theologian caps on and give it go…