The Cross and the cross
The fascination of a mystery novel is the unexpected twists of the plot. No sooner does the reader discover the key fact than a sudden turn or revelation seems to derail the whole story.
This is what the last part of Mark 8 feels like. Jesus realised that the disciples were finally ready to grasp the key fact. So he asked them, 'Who do you say I am?' (8:29), and Peter came out with the great declaration, 'You are the Christ'. But then immediately came the revelation that threatened to derail the story from reaching its fitting, triumphal end: 'He began to teach them that the Son of Man...must be killed'.
The early critics of Great Expectations, who tried to persuade Dickens to give the novel a happy ending, were perhaps missing the whole point of the plot, Similarly, Peter, guided by his natural human sense of rightness, began to rebuke Jesus - only to be soundly rebuked in his turn.
And Jesus didn't leave it at that, but went on to explain that his death had direct implications for his disciples. Ronald Sider has written of this passage: 'Following Christ means living like Jesus... Jesus modelled servanthood, self-sacrifice and special concern for the poor and neglected... All that sounds foreign to our modern ears because we are not accustomed to denying ourselves in order to serve others... Instant gratification is at the core of modern life. Costly self-denial is at the center of Jesus' way. 'If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves, take up their cross and follow me.'...Jesus has a better way, and it leads to far deeper happiness than instant sex and wealth can ever bring. But there is no way round the cross' (Living Like Jesus, 1999).
Christians are called to be counter-cultural, and this involves examining the ways in which we are shaped by the society we live in - our attitudes to work, colleagues, money, time, our aspirations for our family, our feelings about the 'antisocial elements' in our community...
This is how the master story-teller planned the plot of the greatest story ever told.
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