Happy Tuesday, fellow travelers of the Way. It is the second week of Lent, and we have some powerful scriptures for us this week…
Genesis 17:1–17, 15–16
Psalm 22:23–31
Mark 8:31–38
Romans 4:13–25
I invite you to sit with each of these passages this week. For our time together on Sunday I will focus on the Mark scripture…
Mark 8:31-38 New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition
31 Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes and be killed and after three days rise again. 32 He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33 But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”
34 He called the crowd with his disciples and said to them, “If any wish to come after me, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35 For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. 36 For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? 37 Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? 38 Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”
Don’t we all have that friend that is like Peter? You know the person who will say exactly what is on their mind. I don’t want to be too hard on Peter, is it possible he was the one willing to say what everyone was thinking? This is such a contrast to the conversation between Jesus and the disciples just before this passage.
I mean, how could Peter get it so right in the earlier conversation and get it so wrong in this conversation?
What do you notice?
What do you wonder?
What does this conversation mean for us?
What can we learn?
Let’s talk about it on Sunday.
Oh, one last thing, if you don’t have a friend like Peter in your circle, maybe YOU are the Peter… just sayin’.
~ Pastor Dustin
