Text: Mark 8:27-38
Introduction
One of the hopes of the Reformers earlier was an open council of the church. Martin Luther of 1520 thought that everything could be settled if the church just agreed to meet. By 1530, the time of the Augsburg Confession, Luther himself was skeptical, and the reaction toward that confession deepened his skepticism. The Pope called for a council in 1537 – which did not happen – but his call was explicitly “the utter extirpation of the poisonous, pestilential Lutheran heresy”. Melanchthon, Luther’s right hand-guy in Wittenberg, kept hoping for a council much later. But by the time the Council of Trent came around, Martin Chemnitz, a second generation reformer would only write an examination of its documents. It was not an open council. By that time something called confessionalisation was well advanced. Roman Catholics, Lutherans, Calvinists, Zwinglians and Anabaptists were all writing out confessional documents and building dogmatic forts. I happen to subscribe to one of those dogmatic forts, so that shouldn’t be taken as pejoratively as it sounds. But there is a shadow of the cross.
I’m starting with that bit of history, because in the run up to the aborted council, Luther was asked to write both a document that is part of the Lutheran confessions and one alongside of it. The Smalcald Articles are that confessional document, and an essay titled On The Councils and Church was the further writing. It is worth hearing one Smalcald article today - article 12.
We do not agree with them that they are the Church. They are not the Church. Nor will we listen to those things that, under the name of Church, they command or forbid. Thank God, ‹today› a seven-year-old child knows what the Church is, namely, the holy believers and lambs who hear the voice of their Shepherd [John 10:11–16]. For the children pray, “I believe in one holy Christian Church.” This holiness does not come from albs, tonsures, long gowns, and other ceremonies they made up without Holy Scripture, but from God’s Word and true faith.
A rather pungent statement, and something that has always struck me like Justice Potter’s words on pornography – “I know it when I see it”. In the further writing Luther stops being well, Luther, and talks about the seven marks of the church. In order: God’s Word, Baptism, The Lord’s Supper, Confession and Absolution, The ministry, Public Prayer and Worship, and The Cross.
I think you can see that in some way almost all physical or visible churches contain at least some of these marks. A later Lutheran, CFW Walther the guiding light of the LCMS, would talk about felicitous inconsistency. For example, the ELCA and most of mainline Protestantism formally says something like the Scriptures contain the word of God, by which they mean there is a lot of junk in there as well, but nearly all of their ministers at public worship will read them and simply say “This is the Word of God”. A felicitous inconsistency whereby God grants us grace when we can’t help ourselves.
There is nothing startling in the first six of Luther’s marks. It is the Word proclaimed and the sacraments rightly administered from Augsburg. Which at least in my thinking could probably be traced back to Irenaeus in the 2nd century when he held out three – Scriptures, Creed and Ministerium or Bishops. But the seventh mark, while never being denied, is one that probably needs, well, someone of Luther’s disposition to remind us of. Someone desperate enough to take Jesus at his word – what does it profit to gain the world, but lose your soul.
Text
These marks of the church, or marks of the Christian, are part of what I think Jesus is getting at. Jesus asks one of his famous questions – “Who do people say I am?” And the disciples offer up what we can assume was the conventional wisdom of the day. “Some John the Baptist, some Elijah, others another prophet”. A pretty high evaluation for a Jew ranging from a returned eschatologically charged prophet to still a prophet. But then Jesus makes it personal, enough about they, “who do you say that I am?” What has brought you here? What marks do you see?
And Peter steps up and answers. Peter, smart enough to know the answer, but enough of a rock not to look a step beyond it. A fabulous trait that would bring him to the lowest of spots and the highest. Peter shouts out, “You are the Christ”.
“And Jesus began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise. He said this plainly.” Just so that He could be sure Peter would get it. What is a mark of the Christ? The nail marks that Thomas would want to thrust his fingers into. The rejection by all of the good and great. The embarrassment and shame of the cross.
And this was not a mark of the Christ in Peter’s understanding. It was certainly not why Peter had said what he did. “And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.” You can imagine the rebuke. That is not the Christ. These are the marks of the Christ: triumph and victory and glory and 10,000 angels marching and all the gentiles finally getting theirs, and we finally getting ours, and the continuation of the miracles that seem to have slowed down, and….
“Get behind me Satan.” [Pause] It must have been a terrible temptation. All the shiny offerings. All the kingdoms and all their glory. “You are not thinking the things of God, but the things of man.”
“And he called out to the crowd along with his disciples”. Just so you all get it, no wimping out, no turning back, no hiding this mark. “If anyone follows me, pick up your cross and follow.”
The marks of the Christian all flow through and from the cross. This is God’s definition of the Christ. This is the proclamation of his church. Not wisdom or glory or acceptance or fame, but Christ crucified.
Application
That cross, his cross and the crosses the church bears following, stands as the two edged nature of the gospel.
The first edge is what I naturally run from, or something that gets under my all too American sense of liberty. “Whoever is ashamed of my words now, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed…” The demands of the cross might be different for each individual – something that Peter would also level a complaint about. But there is no escaping it. God has ordained it this way. We are creatures. He gets his way. This flesh would love to take God aside and start lecturing him. You don’t get to do that. It offends my pride. It restricts my freedom. And it judges me. This is the end of all your ways. All the things of man end here. Towring o’er the wrecks of time. The tyrant.
Especially when that judgment lands unexpectedly on me. But I’m one of the good guys. The chosen one, the one we’ve been waiting for, is supposed to quickly bring himself…and me, victory. Who do I say you are…the ticket to my best life now. I’d like to reserve that prominent seat at your right or left. In Luther’s day put on the albs and tonsures and long gowns. Maybe more recently walks the halls of power, a comfortable establishment. Being called reverend, or being thought of as respectable good people. Judgment is for those who aren’t quite as good. Don’t force that cross on me.
But that cross also carries a sweeter message, if I can get over my wounded pride. It is a strange tyrant that first bears his own punishment; really no tyrant at all. The cross stands in judgment, but it also stands in peace. In the cross all of that stuff we’d rather hide, God says that’s mine too.
Embarrassment and shame, try the public display and mocking.
Powerlessness, God stumbled under the cross.
Subjugation and submission…led from trial to trial to Calvary to nails.
Instead of being the tyrant pressing judgment on all, the cross – the revelation of God to us of his very nature, says that I’m there, underneath it all. Underneath you. Nothing too low. Jesus, friend of sinners. Jesus, who descend to hell, and rises. Rises, bringing light and life to all who follow him.
Bain and blessing, pain and pleasure, by the cross are sanctified. Blessings are easy to take. Everyone sees God in the good. The church believes God’s Word. Here, at the cross, we see most clearly. Here at the cross we view God rightly. See, from his head, his hands, his feet. Sorrow and love flow mingled down. See the marks of the church. Learn from him, to bear the cross. Amen.