Jesus is the Christ

You are listening to a message from Thrive Community Church, a church located in Southwest Florida. For more info, visit us at thrive-fl.org. So we're going to start actually in the middle of the Gospel of Mark, and you might go like, why? Why would we start in the middle? Well, because how long do you want this series to last? No, but because it is the pivotal verse. It's the fulcrum verse that everything kind of flips on in the Gospel. So the Gospel of Mark actually begins with Mark 1, 1, and it kind of spells out from the beginning. And I think I've got, I know I'm out of order on the slides already, but Mark 1, 1 is there. I think it's the third slide or something, right? And it says this, the beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. So boom, right away you go like, wow, you know, the words come up that Jesus is the Christ. That's not his last name, okay? Do you understand? It's not his last name. Christ is not, you know, it wasn't Joseph Christ and Mary Christ had Jesus Christ. Christ is the Greek word Christos, which is the equivalent to the Hebrew word Mashiach, Messiah for the Anointed One. And so right away, Mark is saying at the beginning, here's good news about Jesus, who is the Anointed One of God, which is really what the kings were anointed. So everybody's looking for somebody like a David to show up, but better, stronger, faster. We can build him even bigger, you know? That's kind of the way that they were looking for Jesus, the Messiah to come. But then what happens in this Gospel is fascinating. He starts out with that verse, and then he doesn't tell you anything about what he means by those words for chapter after chapter after chapter. For eight chapters, Jesus is going about, he's healing, he's teaching, he's causing controversy after controversy, and the crowds turn to him, and his disciples look at him, and they say, who is this that even the wind and waves obey him? Who is this who eats with sinners and tax collectors? Who is this who heals on the Sabbath? And they can't figure out who is he, and what is he about? They keep asking the question, and they're clueless, up until the words of our text today in Mark chapter 8. We're going to read them now, Mark 8, 27 to 38. And Jesus went with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. Now I know, the town Caesarea Philippi probably is like, oh, okay. This is the weirdest thing. So the setting of this whole thing happened. He is right now, if you would find Caesarea Philippi on a map in the Middle East today, it is north, far north of the Sea of Galilee. Jesus is right now the farthest away he can get from Jerusalem, the place of power and authority and political power, religious power, and the center of everything, according to anybody who was Jewish at the time. He is as far away as possible from that, where he reveals who he is, and the disciples, well, you'll see what happened. But that says something already about what kind of a king he's going to be, and what kind of a kingdom, when he is not even near Jerusalem at all, okay? He never even, in the Gospel of Mark, he doesn't even show up in Jerusalem until it's the week he's going to die. Boom. That's it. It's fascinating that way. Anyway, so let's go on. And on the way, he asked his disciples, who do people say that I am? And he told him, and they told him, John the Baptist, and others say Elijah, and one of the prophets. And he asked them, but who do you say that I am? Peter answered him, you are the Christ. And he strictly charged them to tell no one about him, and he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, but turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, get behind me, Satan. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man. And calling the crowds to him with his disciples, he said to them, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospels will save it. For what can a man give in return for his soul? For whoever is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in glory of his Father with the holy angels. Wow, okay. From this, this is the fulcrum. The rest of the gospel now of Mark is going to go in this direction of explaining what kind of a king he is, and what kind of a kingdom it is, and what it means to follow. And that's what we're going to look at in this time. Even the church, the tradition of the church, of kind of the Western church at a point, the 40 days before Easter was set aside as a time to reflect on the cross and on what Jesus was doing, and on all of that. And not ju...