Mark 8:22–9:1 — Seeing Truly

This sermon is from Mark chapter 8 verse 22 through chapter 9 verse 1 and is

Mark 8:22

entitled "Seeing Truly." It was delivered to Ecclesia churches on Sunday, September

21st, 2025. In the last few chapters we've heard Jesus talk about seeing and

believing and hearing and understanding a lot. And they've all been leading us

actually through the last eight chapters,

the whole first half of Mark,

has been leading us toward this moment,

this moment in which the disciples will finally

settle their minds about exactly who Jesus is,

and will turn toward the natural next question of,

so what, or what do we do with that?

And it's taken them a long while to get here.

They've seen him do miraculous healings,

and they've believed that he was a healer of some kind.

They've seen him command crowds and demons alike

in their hometown and beyond,

leading them to believe that he's at the very least

some kind of prophet who is anointed by God with authority.

And then they've had these unique experiences

in which he has done something that goes beyond

even what the prophets had done.

Things like quieting the storm with a word,

things like walking on water,

things that made them ask the question, sometimes out loud, "Who is this?"

And so they are about to see, at least in part, and recognize that Jesus is in fact more than

a teacher, more than a prophet, but is in fact the Son of God, the Christ or the Messiah,

who all of Israel and the whole waiting world has been waiting for.

But even after they see that clearly, they still don't understand what it's going to

mean for the mission of Jesus.

They have some preconceived ideas about just what the Messiah has come to do, and dying

on the cross isn't even on that list.

So let's begin with the first part of our passage in which we see almost a mini-parable

play out that shows us what is about to happen with the disciples.

This is Mark 8, starting with verse 22.

"And they came to Bethsaida, and some people brought to him a blind man, and begged him to touch him.

And he took the blind man by the hand, and led him out of the village; and when he had spit on

his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, 'Do you see anything?' And he looked up and

But I see people, but they look like trees walking.

Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again, and he opened his eyes.

His sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.

And he sent him to his home, saying, "Do not even enter the village."

The story of the blind man plays out with startling similarity to the deaf and mute

man from only a few verses back. People bring the man to Jesus, they ask for his touch and healing,

he takes the man away from the people, there's the spit, there's the laying on of the hands,

all this Jesus has done before. He's not trying to increase his reputation as a healer,

lest it get in the way of his actual mission that ends at the cross. So he's doing these

standard healer types of things that the man would have expected, that the blind man would

have understood he's doing, but then it gets kind of weird.

So the question is, does Jesus fail to heal on the first try here?

No.

Notice, it doesn't say that he tried to heal and then tried again.

All Jesus does is lay his hands on the man and ask him a question.

Do you see anything?

And his answer is one of confusion.

He sees people, but they look like walking trees, almost like something out of Lord of

the Rings, right?

The ants, the walking trees.

He sees something, but he can't make sense of what he's seeing.

Keep that in mind for later.

When Jesus opens his eyes and his sight is restored to perfect clarity, and again, Jesus

wants to minimize the response to the healing at this point.

He says, "Don't even go back into the village.

Go to your home."

And we know as the reader that Jesus is getting close to starting the journey back to Jerusalem

at this point.

And a crowd of people who are convinced that Jesus is a healer will probably not help him

to do that.

Now I mentioned earlier that this is the type of mini parable,

and I think you'll see what I mean

after we read the next section,

but I just wanna clarify that this healing event

is not a fictional parable itself.

It is something that really happened.

So I'm not saying that this story Mark is relaying

is an allegory, but rather the reason we find it here

is that it serves as a picture

of what is about to happen with the disciples.

Remember, Jesus was calling them out only verses ago for not seeing or hearing, and

He wasn't talking about their eyes and ears functioning as designed.

He was talking about their spiritual understanding.

So let's read on to see this play out.

This is starting with verse 27.

And Jesus went on with His disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi, and on the

way He asked His disciples, "Who do people say that I am?

And they told him, "John the Baptist and others say Elijah and others say one of the

prophets."

And he asked them, "But who do you say that I am?"

Peter answered him, "You are the Christ."

And he strictly charged them to tell no one about him.

So finally, a correct proclamation.

Peter, speaking up for all of them, by the way, declares, "You are the Christ."

title Christ means anointed one in Greek. It's a translation of the Hebrew word Messiah.

This is a hugely significant confession because it identifies Jesus finally from the lips

of the disciples as the long-awaited deliverer promised throughout the Old Testament.

They have gone from believing Jesus is someone sent by God to believing Jesus is THE one

sent by God. And let's not miss the setting that this happens in.

Jesus takes them to Caesarea Philippi, which is a city right at the edge of outright pagan territory,

out of which flows one of the mainsprings that feeds the Jordan River.

And so a few things about this city. This city is named by Philip, one of the sons of Herod,

after himself and after Caesar, who believed himself to be a kind of god. People would swear

allegiance to Caesar as Lord. It's also a destination for pagans who have come to worship the god Pan,

who is, among other things, the god of sheep and shepherds. Kind of ironic. It is also known for

the caves that have been carved into the walls as tribute to these pagan gods, and one cave in

particular, which was believed to be the entrance, or an entrance, to the underworld. So do you catch

all of the irony in that? I certainly didn't when I first learned about this, but Jesus is making

a point. Let me walk you through some of these, because some of them just blow my mind. The good

This shepherd has led his sheep to the shrine of a false god of shepherds to ask them a

question about who he is.

He is contrasting himself with false gods and showing himself to be the true god.

Another way is the eternal king leads his followers to a city named after a petty earthly

king to ask about their allegiance to him.

And then finally, Jesus has walked right into the region known as the entrance to hell to

reveal how he will take the keys to death itself.

That happens a little later in the passage, but that's one of the things he talks about

here.

So the headlines for this passage just about write themselves, but for all the theatrics

of the location, look at the way he leads his disciples to answer this question.

He begins by asking, "Who do people say I am?"

Because he knows that they've been listening to the crowds, to the Pharisees, to everyone

else, and that these people hold potential influence.

Remember, he's even warned them about the teachings of these people, that it can infect

even those who think they are close to Jesus.

But then he follows it up with the more important question, which is, "What do you say?"

People are saying all kinds of things.

Some of them think that he's John the Baptist come back to life after being murdered by

Herod.

They think he's a ghost of some kind.

Some say that he's Elijah.

So Elijah was taken up bodily into heaven and was prophesied to return.

So they think he's not a ghost, but he's a man come back from heaven.

And some say he's another one of the prophets of old, think like David, Samuel, the list

goes on.

But each of these categories that don't fit Jesus exactly mean that each version of Jesus

that fits into those categories wouldn't have been who Jesus actually is.

So Jesus asks that all-important question, "Who do you say that I am?"

Which Peter answers correctly.

Finally, their eyes are beginning at least to be opened to who Jesus really is.

And the all-important question actually wasn't, "What do other people say that I am?

It's, 'Who do you say that I am?'"

So the truth for them and for us is that Christianity is not a religion that you can be grandfathered

or fathered into.

You cannot be brought in by association or by the good intentions or wishes of others.

Following Jesus relies on the answer to a question that you must make for yourself, and it is

the question, "Who do you say I am?" And what are you going to do about it?

And just as important is ensuring that the Jesus you are choosing to follow and declare

is the real Jesus, the one revealed by all of Scripture. Choosing to follow a knockoff

version and imposter will lead you just as far astray as trying to define Him just for

yourself. Because the truth is, the clarity with which we see Jesus impacts how we understand

living as disciples of him, which impacts pretty much everything else in life.

And this is one reason that Jesus recognizes this confession of the disciples as true,

but also charges them not to say anything.

Because just like he didn't let the half-blind man go on his way believing that people looked

like walking trees, he's not going to let the disciples leave with a half understanding

of who he is.

They're not ready to declare him to others yet because they don't fully see who he is,

even though they got the title of Christ right.

They don't understand what that really means for the mission of Jesus, and ultimately those

who will follow him on it.

So let's read a little further to see how Jesus starts unveiling the truth about himself

further and how the disciples struggle to understand.

This is Mark 8.31-33.

He says, "And he 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 again.

And he said this plainly.

And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.

turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, "Get behind me, Satan, for

you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man."

You need to understand that even though Scripture had been quite clear about the role of the

Messiah, just like with the law, other expectations had been added over the last few centuries.

So passages like Isaiah 53, Psalm 22, Zechariah 12 all have pretty clearly laid out how the

Messiah was going to come and suffer and be rejected and die for His people.

Yet, He would also eventually reign as King, but first He would atone for sin as a sacrifice.

However, in the past few hundred years, the Jews have had the life experience of watching

one leader after another rise up and either claim to be the Messiah or act like the military

leader that they might expect the Messiah to be.

And each of them, from military families like the Maccabees to one-off false prophets, had

risen up against the Empire and then been crushed by it.

So after seeing an awful lot of false Messiahs and having a lot of hope dashed, they had a

a pretty specific list of expectations of the Messiah.

And the biblical Old Testament scripture version of the Messiah starts to fade into the background

for them because it's not the Messiah they wanted.

They wanted a military leader like David.

They wanted somebody who would restore and cleanse the temple from Roman influence.

He would return Israel to their former glory as a kingdom.

He would be the leader that they wanted him to be.

And suffering and sacrifice weren't really a part of that.

And so Jesus begins by presenting in clear terms what the actual role of the Messiah

will be according to Scripture.

He will suffer and be rejected by the very leaders who were supposed to be the pinnacle

of humanity, the most holy men available.

It wasn't the worst people who would kill him.

It was the very best, according to the Jewish view of things.

And he would die, and he would rise from the dead.

And this all would happen not as a failure of the plan, but as the whole point of the

plan for Israel's salvation and for ours.

Peter of course, voices opposition to this unthinkable version of the plan, this unthinkable

version of the Messiah.

And I don't think that Peter was the only one to think this, but he was the only one

brazen enough to actually rebuke Jesus. So Jesus turns and he sees his disciples watching and

he recognizes that Peter is their spokesperson. He also recognizes this rebuke for what it is.

It is an opposition to the plan of God, and it comes from the perspective of man.

This is the primary way that Satan, here named by Jesus, works as the adversary.

He tries to get us not to trust God and God's plan, and instead to choose the wisdom of men

on our own plan. That's how it worked in the Garden of Eden and in some form in every deception

since. The thing about this deception, particularly when it comes to Jesus, is that it's usually

something pretty easy to believe from man's perspective. It's actually convenient to only

present Jesus the way we want him to be according to our plans. That's an easy change to make.

Choosing to believe that the love of Jesus can be defined however I want it to be,

instead of by the truth of his word. It sure is nice to have a version of Jesus that doesn't

confront our sin and the sin of others, but that's not the truth, is it? How about choosing to believe

that Jesus is the only way to know God. It sure would be easy to believe Jesus isn't the exclusive

way to the Father, and everybody will get there in their own way, but that's not the truth. So in

order for the gospel of Jesus to be good news, it also has to be true. So just like the disciples,

we have to know Jesus for who he is and to understand his mission. The truth that Jesus

Jesus is telling them is that it is not the domination of Rome that is the problem the

Messiah came to solve.

It was their residence in the dominion of darkness, the fact that they were slaves to sin and

that the payment to free them from that was death.

But it was also true that he would rise again and the only one to do so in order to be the

only way to salvation.

is who Jesus is according to Scripture. And the disciples needed to understand his role,

to understand the mission. And they had to understand the mission to know how to truly

follow him. So let's look at how Jesus lays that out for them in these last few verses.

What does it look like to follow Jesus? This is starting with verse 34 all the way through

Chapter 9 verse 1.

For what can a man give in return for his soul?

For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation of

Him will the Son of man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his father with the holy angels.

And he said to them, "Truly I say to you,

there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God after it has come with power."

"If the Messiah came to suffer in order to give us freedom, then eternal freedom in Christ

is going to come at the cost of some earthly suffering."

Let me just say that again.

"If the Messiah came to suffer in order to give us freedom, then eternal freedom in Christ

is going to come at the cost of some earthly suffering."

So those that choose to follow Jesus are willingly choosing to participate in at least these

two things.

First, self-denial.

And second, some level of social persecution.

Let's talk about self-denial.

It's the first thing Jesus mentions for his followers to be aware of that they will suffer.

Because our sinful flesh really is our first adversary.

we will be tempted to sin because we live in a sinful body, in a sinful world.

But following Jesus looks like denying the desires of our sinful flesh and choosing instead

self-control that honors God.

And the good news is that for the Christian, we know we are not left to do this on our

own steam, our own strength, but we are empowered by the Holy Spirit to do this.

We went through a message in Galatians a while back that you can go back to if you want to

hear more details about this.

And while we deny sinful longings like overindulgence, lust, violence, and everything that feels

good now but leads to death later, we keep our eyes fixed on the prize, which is the

freedom of our soul in Jesus.

Jesus says that there is nothing, there's no pleasure or treasure on this earth that

is worth the price of losing your soul.

And our own flesh isn't the only contender for the price of our soul.

We are surrounded by lost sinful people and a lost sinful culture and a spiritual war

that is happening right now as I speak over our souls.

So when Jesus says, "Take up your cross," the first image in their minds for them wasn't

golden necklace, for example, that you might hang around your neck. It wasn't a

sign of a religious order, it wasn't on top of buildings, it wasn't something

that people liked to talk about much, because in the first century the cross

was a symbol of the brutal oppression and violent control of Rome over the

people that they had conquered. It was a method of public execution. It had more

in common with an electric chair or a firing line. It was like Jesus was saying, "If you

are going to follow me, make sure you have a gravestone picked out, because you will

be opposed. You will face opposition of the most serious kind." On one hand, I'm really

grateful that I live in a country where the chances of that happening are pretty low,

now anyway, that I'll be killed for following Jesus.

But even recent events in our country have shown us that even in America, that possibility

is still there.

But instead of saying, "I hope it never comes to that," I think it would be far more applicable

to say, "What does it look like for me now to joyfully endure that?"

Asking questions like, "Am I ready to lose friends and have family turn me away for

continuing to share the gospel of Jesus with them.

Am I ready to experience small town persecution

for prioritizing Jesus and his mission

over the broken priorities of my community?

I grew up in small town Iowa,

and so I understand the tension and the pull of that,

especially when it comes to our lives and our kids.

Are you ready to live a life

of what seems like radically intentional community in a city

that prioritizes privacy and anonymity.

Are you ready, for example, to be known as the weird neighbor

who's always coming out to greet your neighbors

before they shut their garage doors?

Maybe you're like me and all of this talk about suffering

has you asking, wait, why am I doing this again?

Why am I denying myself?

Why am I willingly doing and saying things

that are going to lead to conflict

the world around me. And the simple answer is, because I want to follow Jesus and I want to

truly see his kingdom. Your eternal soul is worth so much that nothing in this life comes close

to the value of it. And the enemy knows that and is fighting tooth and nail to convince you

to trade it in for things that will one day fall apart into nothing. But Jesus also values us.

enough to come in the flesh and walk among us for a lifetime and die unjustly at the hands of men

and then rise from the dead to offer salvation to people like them and people like us. Your eternal

soul to Jesus was worth his body being broken and his blood being shed on your behalf. Jesus'

death on the cross, which was the culmination of this whole mission was in fact the very first

glimpse of the kingdom of God coming in power. It was the power to free us from the slavery of sin.

And it was going to happen in a way that the disciples didn't quite understand yet,

through a sacrifice that they didn't see coming and couldn't wrap their minds around.

Jesus becomes the suffering servant predicted by Isaiah and in doing so shows us the glory

through his death and resurrection. Which is why Jesus says to his disciples in

chapter 9 verse 1, "There are some standing here who will not taste death

until they see the kingdom of God after it has come with power." They didn't

understand it, but we do. That the kingdom of God was coming with power, not

through a Messiah who would bring restoration only to the earthly kingdom

of Israel, but through a Messiah who through his death and resurrection was offering eternal

restoration between God and man.

Ecclesia is a church of house churches gathering weekly in Councilbloss, Iowa and in homes

throughout the week.

We are a Bible-centered church focused on preaching from Scripture and making disciples

of Jesus.

You can learn more about our statement of faith and contact a pastor by visiting Ecclesia

www.pitches.org