Sunday Worship Service November 10, 2024

Prelude
Call to Worship
Hymn JBC # 618
The Lord’s Prayer
Hymn JBC #236
Offering
Scripture Luke 9:18～27
Prayer
Sermon “Prediction of Death and Resurrection”
Prayer
Hymn JBC # 230
Doxology JBC # 676
Benediction
Postlude

I think it is a common belief among non-Christians that “Jesus Christ” is one of the greatest historical figures, or one of the most influential figures in history.
　As such, Jesus Christ is generally considered to be only one of the great human beings. Jesus was one of the great human beings who taught people to love their neighbors (and practiced it himself) and healed many people of their illnesses.
　In today's scripture passage, Jesus asked the disciples who were with him: “Who do the crowds say I am?”
　The disciples replied. Some say “John the Baptist”; others say “Elijah”; and still others, “that one of the prophets of long ago has come back to life.”
John the Baptist was the one who also baptized Jesus. He was a then great religious leader who strongly encouraged people to turn to God (repent).
　Elijah was one of the great prophets of the Old Testament era. Prophets were those who were entrusted with the word of God and were responsible for conveying it to the people.

　　“that one of the prophets of long ago has come back to life”means that there were people who were saying “This man Jesus is doing such wonderful works that he must be a great prophet of old come back to life.
　To be precise, "come back to life" would mean that he is like the second coming of such a great prophet.
I don't think the people who said it actually believed that the prophets who had died hundreds of years before Jesus actually came back to life.
　　But John the Baptist, as well as Elijah and other great prophets, they all were only human. They were not gods.
　Like the general idea today, many people in Jesus' time too still thought that the man Jesus was great, but Jesus was only one man.
Then Jesus asked his disciples as follows.
“Who do you say I am?”(verse 20)

“I now know that people are saying things about me. So people are saying that I am one of the great but human beings. Then who do you say I am?” Jesus asked.
To this question, Peter answered. “God’s Messiah”. Messiah originally means ‘anointed (oil-poured) one’in Hebrew.
It is said to have originated from the special perfume oil that was poured on kings and priests in Israel when they were inaugurated, and eventually came to mean “God's savior”.
　In New Testament times, that era in which Jesus lived, it was believed that the Messiah (God's Savior) who would soon come would deliver the people of Israel from the Roman Empire that ruled over them.
Thus, in Jesus' time, people were looking forward to the coming of the Savior as a political liberator (military leader).

　When Peter replied, “You are the God’s Messiah,” Jesus admonished the disciples, commanding them not to tell anyone about it (v. 21).
Why did Jesus stop his disciples from making such a confession, confessing that “Jesus is the Messiah”?
Messiah was eventually translated into Greek as Christ, giving birth to the words of confession of faith, “Jesus Christ,” meaning “Jesus is the Christ (Savior).
The content of the saying “You are God’s Messiah” was not wrong. It was true. Jesus was without a doubt the true Messiah (Savior) sent from God.
However, in response to Peter's confession, Jesus commanded his disciples, “Do not tell anyone about it. Why?
This is because Peter and the other disciples did not yet understand what “Messiah” really meant and what Jesus was going to accomplish.

　The disciples were expecting a great Messiah who would reestablish the nation of Israel and free their nation from the Roman Empire.
　But Jesus did not come to be such a Messiah; in verse 22, Jesus said
“The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.”

　Jesus spoke of what was about to befall Him, of being rejected by the people, of being killed on the cross, and then of His resurrection on the third day.
　Jesus foretold His death and resurrection by saying that Christ would first be rejected by the people and killed, and then rise again.
　Jesus said that He is the Messiah who truly liberates people (frees them from sin) in the sense that He, who is equal to God, saves people by offering His life.
　Jesus was the Messiah as the One who leads people to true liberation through such a death, where he wholly takes the hatred, malice, and ridicule of people by himself, and then is killed in an unjust trial by men.
　To truly liberate a person, Jesus said, he must first die.
Jesus foretold His death and resurrection in advance so that His disciples would be able to face the reality of the event when it actually occurred.
　Who do we now confess Jesus Christ is? If Jesus asked you now “Who do you say I am?”, who would we answer?
　Are we not believing in and confessing Christ based on the image of the Savior that we have willfully imagined and created for ourselves?
We always want to listen to the Bible and be led by the Holy Spirit to understand Jesus Christ as the Bible tells us He is, in His proper form.
We, too, wish to confess our faith, “You are God’s Messiah (Christ, the Savior).”

Let us believe that with all our hearts, and let us believe and rejoice that “this One has saved us from our deepest sins,” and let us continue to confess as such.
Jesus also went on to say: read verses 23-25.

23 Then he said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. 24 For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it. 25 What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit their very self?

　　Jesus says to his disciples, and to us believers throughout the ages and now, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.”
What does it mean to “deny yourselves and take up your cross daily”? The word “cross” is usually thought of as a “burden” that each of us bears.
　However, I believe that some of you have already carried enough “burdens” and are living under very hard and difficult circumstances.
　All of us carry burdens in our lives. Does Jesus tell us to carry an even heavier burden, a cross in that sense, in order to follow Him?
　To me, it seems very unlikely. When Jesus said, “take up your cross daily and follow me,” I think he meant that we should first know that Jesus first carried the heaviest cross for us.
　That Jesus is walking with us even now. Therefore, I believe that Jesus is calling us to entrust the burdens of life given to each of us to Him and ask Him to carry them with us as we walk and live.
　It is possible through faith to walk with Jesus, trusting in Him who is with us day by day (every day). Let us be convinced again today of the blessedness of living in Jesus' love and mercy.

Let’s listen to what Jesus said in verse 24 once more.
For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it.
　We must understand what Jesus meant by these words, not literally but what it truly means. It does not mean that we would give our lives for Jesus.
　Jesus does not need to be offered a life from us. Rather, Jesus laid down His life for the atonement of our sins.
　When Jesus said, “lose your life for my sake,” he meant that we place Jesus at the center of our purpose in life.
　It means that we do not put our own wishes and thoughts first, but live daily with the purpose of living God's will as revealed through Jesus.
　We feel unsatisfied and dissatisfied when things do not go the way we wish or envision. We may even think that “my life has failed” when things do not turn out the way we hoped they would.
　But if we place the purpose of our life in Jesus and turn our direction of life to Jesus Christ, then we will live true life.
　By placing Christ in the center of our hearts and changing our direction to a life lived toward Him, our self-centeredness instead of God-centeredness will be corrected, and our lives will truly be saved.
　We can receive true life by being freed (saved) from the sin of self-centeredness and the misery caused by that sin and redirected to a God-centered life filled with firmness and peace.
To receive such true life, let us live daily according to Christ, confessing Him as our Savior by both word and life.
　Jesus bore the heaviest burden, the cross for the forgiveness of our sins, and died on that cross. Let us remember this daily and offer our hearts of gratitude and repentance to God.
　Jesus is with us, bearing the burdens of our lives. With eyes of faith, let us recognize Jesus' presence with us, and let us walk in days of hope and thanksgiving by faith.