Jesus Predicts His Death
31 He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again. 32 He spoke plainly about this, and Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33 But when Jesus turned and looked at his disciples, he rebuked Peter. “Get behind me, Satan!” he said. “You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”
18th October 2024: Horsham
The contemporary expectation of the Messiah was pretty straightforward. You can write it like a list of objectives.
- Rebuild and cleanse the Temple in Jerusalem
- Defeat the enemies of Israel – Get rid of the Roman occupiers
- Establish the Kingdom of God, with Israel at the heart of the Kingdom
In Mark’s narrative, this conversation happens immediately after Peter has made his extraordinary declaration that Jesus is the Christ – the Messiah. There’s a huge contrast between the two cameos.
Try to see this snippet of conversation from Peter’s perspective. He’s grown up and lived in a society which had this clear expectation of what the Messiah would deliver. It would have been constantly affirmed in synagogue teaching.
‘Messiah at this point is not about divinity. It is about the saving King of Israel.’ (NT Wright)
Peter has just declared that he believes Jesus is the Messiah, so his expectations are high. It would have seemed very strange to him and the other disciples that, rather planning for earthly victory, Jesus is teaching about the inevitability of his own violent death at the hands of the leaders of Israel.
In that context, you might be able to see why Peter takes Jesus to one side and sort of rebukes him. Jesus has done extraordinary miracles. As Messiah, he can do anything. He only needs to say the word and can assume supreme power and authority to rule Israel and conquer the entire world. That’s what the Messiah would do. Right?
Jesus is teaching that his path leads to the cross. Peter is pointing out to Jesus that his violent death is not inevitable. There is another way. A better way, surely?
I wonder whether you remember a moment, some years earlier, at the start of his ministry when Jesus was taken to a very high mountain and invited to look down on all the kingdoms of the world and their splendour.
‘All this I will give you if you bow down and worship me!’ (Matthew 4:9)
Jesus knows the path which God has set before him. It is a deeply challenging path. Jesus must resist all human temptation to deviate from God’s plan. Perhaps Christ’s words are directed not at Peter, but at the one who is really behind this temptation. His message is the same as it was when he was tempted with that promise in the wilderness directly by Satan himself. The verb used is the same.
‘Get away from me Satan!’