The Gospel of Mark

Mark’s Gospel is a straightforward, in your face, take it as it is account of Jesus’ life. Mark’s meaning lies completely on the surface. And yet, we are told in the first verse that the story that is about to be told is merely a beginning.

And yet in this statement, the original readers had a problem of immense proportions. If Jesus really was the Christ, the promised one who would remove the Roman yoke from the neck of Israel, how is it that he was crucified?

Criminals were crucified, and not just any criminals, but only the worst sort. So how could he be the Christ and be crucified? That didn’t make any sense. It’s like someone claiming to be the Son of God and then being convicted of child molestation. The two are so totally at odds that they can’t both be true. That was in the minds of most people whether Jew or Gentile.

So Mark writes a defense of the cross by portraying Jesus as someone who always had the victory. His enemies never won, he controlled the created order, he publicly humiliated the religious leaders, and he healed everyone who came to him. Even in his death, he controlled the situation.

The following sermons trace the life of Jesus with an eye towards defending his death on the cross.

Note: We live in a fallen world. One example to this is the fact that some of the sermons in this series have been lost. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.