The Secret
Sermon by the Revd Dr Brutus Green
Readings: 2 Kings 2.1-12, Psalm 50.1-6, 2 Corinthians 4.3-6, Mark 9.2-9
Who is Jesus? And am I prepared to follow him?
One way to answer this is to pick up the New Testament and start at the beginning. The first line of the first book, the Gospel of Mark, reads, in the modern translation: ‘The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.’ And with a stroke of a pen, or a quill, the world is transformed.
The King James version of 1611 began: ‘The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God;’ which given it’s called the Gospel makes a lot of sense. Intriguingly modern translations still call the four Gospels ‘Gospels’, but the word Gospel in the Gospel is now translated ‘Good news’. For the nerds out there, Gospel is old English from God-spel – good message – which translates the Greek: euangelion. Euangelion is a combination of eu and angelion – eu meaning good (as in euthanasia – eu and Thanatos – good death – or eulogy – eu and logos – good words) and angelion – message – from which we also get the word ‘angel’, meaning messenger. So the Gospel is the announcement of this good news, this good message, that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.
In today’s Gospel we have this revealed to the disciples – Jesus falls into some good lighting and is transfigured – and the divine voice booms ‘this is my Son’; Again, the revelation of Jesus as the Son of God. But then this strange thing. As they’re coming down the mountain, Jesus orders ‘them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead.’
Jesus has come to reveal God to the world. He is the revelation of God in the world. This book is written to tell the story of those events. Why on this and many other occasions in Mark’s Gospel is Jesus keeping a low profile? Why is he acting in secret? Why is he shhshing his disciples? Was he, like so many children, embarrassed by his Father?
In Mark’s Gospel he forbids demons, the disciples, even those he cures of speaking of his power. This seems particularly odd when he raises a girl from the dead – Jairus’ daughter. Crowds are already there to mourn her. It seems this unusual act might just draw attention. Then in the parables, we’re told he’s deliberate obscure so not everyone will understand: ‘To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside, everything comes in parables; in order that
“they may indeed look, but not perceive,
and may indeed listen, but not understand;’ (4.11-12a)
Parables are to conceal as much as to reveal. He also frequently withdraws and sometimes hides. There’s a consistent sense of the hiddenness of the mission. And this is strange. It’s also wholly at odds with the Gospel of John.
The most plausible explanation for this is that Mark’s Gospel bears witness to a clash of answers to the question ‘who is Jesus?’ and this is played out until the resurrection under a cloak of secrecy.
So the first answer to the question ‘who is Jesus’, is that he’s the messiah; not a very naughty boy, but the Son of David. The expected Messiah of the day was a political leader, like king David, restoring the independence of the Jewish nation. Mark’s Gospel does infrequently speak of him in these terms, but he plays down these elements, especially compared with Matthew. Peter famously refers to him as the Christ but seconds later is rebuked for not understanding that his role is to suffer, not start a revolution; Likewise, Jesus chastises the disciples for wanting privileged places at his right and left. And it’s notable that in this Gospel, Galilee has a more prominent place than Judah in Jesus’ ministry, And while the Jerusalem Church was waiting for Jesus to return with Messianic thunder, Mark’s theology, like St Paul, has already moved beyond the expectations of Judaism.
The second answer to the question ‘who is Jesus’ is that he’s a divine-man, like the Greek gods. And we can see this in Mark. Jesus controls the natural world – the storms and sea. He has complete authority over the supernatural. Demons obey him. He’s a wonder-worker. We heard today how he was transfigured. This very likely would be how initially gentiles would understand him: a god-man.
Mark doesn’t dismiss these answers. But he prioritises the title ‘Son of God’, and uses that to the question of who is Jesus. As I said earlier, the Gospel begins by announcing the good news of Jesus, the ‘Son of God’, not the Messiah or the Son of David. And at the key moments Mark reaches for the term ‘Son of God’. At Jesus’ baptism, the voice speaks: ‘You are my Son’, as also in today’s Gospel at the transfiguration.
Jesus refers to himself as ‘the Son’ (13.32), as do the demons who recognise him (3.11). And at the crucifixion, witnessing Jesus death, the Centurion will pronounce, ‘truly this was man was God’s son!’ This title ‘Son of God’ is frequently associated with the divine necessity of his redemptive suffering and death. So although Jesus is the Messiah and the divine Superman, on both counts the definition is qualified by this surprising twist: That the revelation of divine love is made not by shock and awe, or through the political emancipation of the Jewish people, but through the Son of God on the cross.
This is the secret that is carried through Jesus’ life – such that even the disciples don’t understand it. And explains why the first disciples get it so wrong.But after the resurrection, the true meaning of this life and these events is understood.
Throughout Mark, the disciples represent the ‘Son of David’ messianic outlook as they have their moment in the sun entering Jerusalem on Palm Sunday; The demons recognise the divine man, and the people know him through healings and miracles; But the hidden nature of Christ as the suffering servant; the theology of the cross embodied in the title of Jesus as ‘Son of God’, as the centurion hails him in his dying moment, is hidden from the crowds, from the authorities and from the disciples. It’s only realised after the resurrection. And not by all, as St Paul says: ‘our Gospel is veiled to those who are perishing’
Now this might seem like a technical issue. The wrestling of the Early Church to make sense of what they had witnessed and what the Spirit was teaching them. But the question remains a live one? Who is Jesus Christ? Who do you say that I am?
The last book of the New Testament gives you the opposite answer to the first. To expect the Return of the King, to bring a final victory on earth to the Church is not the message of Mark’s Gospel. The nineteenth century is probably the closest the world will come to total Christendom and some odd things happen when Christianity gets confused with power. If you’ve watched the Handmaid’s Tale, you’ll know exactly what I mean. And I’ve certainly met Christians who have become caught up either on the return of Jesus and the judgement of the world; Or on the power of the god-man over the world and the route to becoming #blessed. Both answer the question ‘who is Jesus Christ’ in ways that Mark warns against. The victory of the Son of God is the victory of love, not the victory of power. But Jesus is misinterpreted in the Gospel and still today. He remains highly visible. Lifted up. But people very often find in him what they want to find, and it’s as easy to find the Gospel of Judas as it is to find the Gospel of Mark.
But if we’ve understood who Jesus is – the next question is, ‘can I follow him?’ Which is to say ‘Can I become like him?’ If he’s a political leader or a god-man this is easy to answer – but like Peter and the disciples we may fall away later. To follow the suffering Son of Man is a harder task; but it’s a good question to ask as we enter Lent, and it’s a good question to ask in a pandemic. As we now return from the mountain top, and prepare to enter the desert, we should ask ourselves: ‘Who is Jesus?’ and ‘Am I ready to follow him?’ We have the reassurance, from the beginning, that it’s still good news. And that’s even if, today, it seems like the world’s best kept secret. Amen.