This Can't Be the Right Road, Can It?

6 · The pastor begins the first main point: the road exists because of us

The first is this road, the road because of us. This road that Jesus walks is because of us. Now, the reality of the Gospel of Mark is that you see Jesus overcome every kind of opposition in the Gospel of Mark, right? I mean, diseases cannot stand against him. He heals them instantly. Demonic legions thrown against him can't stand him, and he casts them out with a word. The forces of nature and storms come against him, and he calms them with a word. So what Jesus experiences, it appears that Jesus is passive in a sense, being led along by these events, but he is far from passive. Jesus chose the road of the cross.

He says repeatedly in the Gospel of Mark, I'm going to be delivered in the hands of sinful men. I'm going to suffer, die, and rise again. Jesus chose this. He chooses to come back to Jerusalem knowing what awaits him. He chooses to stay every minute where he is on the road to the cross.

So the question is, why? Why does Jesus do this? It's unjust. It's wrong. Why does he do this?

Because He does it for us. Now, one of the things that I was talking to Andrew in between services, and he was pointing out that when we read the Gospels, one of the things we often do is we look for ourselves, right? We're like, oh, I'm kind of a Peter, you know, I'm kind of a, you know, Peter. And we begin to think like, oh, you know, Jesus is Jesus, but I'm also there and I'm also doing great, right? And in the Gospels, Systematically, what Mark does is he says, okay, every single person fails except for Jesus.

And when we look for ourselves in the gospels, we're often looking in the wrong place. We're looking for the heroes. We're looking for who's heroic like me, where the gospels are written, especially Mark is written as a mirror to us. We're meant to find ourselves in a sense, not in the gallery of heroes. But in the crowd shouting for Jesus' crucifixion.

And there are, I think, a few ways that that is true here, that this scene is written with a mirror, right? This scene is a mirror for us. Look at some of these things and see if we can see some reflections of ourselves. First, you see the sinful instigators. You see the Sanhedrin's evil actions as Jesus is put on the cross.

Pushed down this unjust road, this sham of a trial we saw last week. Pilate, their motives are so obvious that Pilate is even like, you're just doing this out of envy. You're just jealous of him. That's the only reason you're pushing him down this road to the cross. Pilate knows he's innocent, yet these people continue to push and push for his death, not just for his silence, not just for his exile, but for his death.

They must kill him. Kill him, he's such a threat to them. Then you've got Pilate who seems, in a sense, passive. In one of the Gospels, he washes his hands and says, 'Listen, I don't have anything to do with this.' But you read the narrative and he has everything to do with it. He stands by while an innocent man is brutally murdered through an unjust legal process.

Right? You see in the Sanhedrin the sin of commission, but you see in Pilate the sin of omission, right? He does not do the good he ought to. And then in the crowd that gets whipped up against Jesus and in the guards, you see people that are more than happy. They see evil happening and they're more than happy to simply go along with the evil.

And we look at that and we're like, oh, this is so ugly. This is an ugly picture. Of the people of Jesus' day, but maybe closer to us than we want to admit.

7 · The pastor illustrates the human tendency to reject self-recognition in sin through a story of a man who smashes a mirror rather than accept his own reflection

Kent Hughes' commentary, he shares a story about a missionary in Africa. And one of the occurrences was that this local person comes to see the missionary, and the missionary had had a mirror hung up on the tree. And so the person had never seen a mirror before. And so he became alarmed when he could see a face in the mirror and he didn't like it. And so he told the missionary, 'I need to buy this from you. I have to buy this from you.' and became agitated. So the missionary is just trying to, okay, I'm trying to be friendly with the locals. I guess I just won't have a mirror anymore. So he gives the mirror to the local and the local takes it, looks at it, smashes it on the ground. And the missionary is like, whoa, what's going on? And the local person says, now that ugly man will never make faces at me again. Right?

Not getting the irony that the missionary is thinking, 'But you know that's you, right? Like, right?' In the same way, the Gospel of Mark shows us this ugly picture of the crowd, of this passive person allowing injustice to happen, of people shouting for crucifixion. And we think, 'Oh, that's so ugly,' where in reality, it's a mirror.

8 · The pastor applies the mirror directly to the congregation through a series of rhetorical questions, pressing the listener to acknowledge personal sin of commission and omission

Brothers and sisters, have we ever been threatened by God's rule in our lives so much that we're willing to cast it off and push it off at any cost? Have we ever been threatened by Jesus and decided to turn away from him rather than follow him? Have we ever been like Pilate where we know the good we ought to do and do not do it? Where we see an opportunity or a need to love our neighbor and we simply pass on by the other side? Have we withheld mercy or forgiveness? Have we turned away from kindness? Have we sinned against a spouse or sinned against a friend or sinned against the Lord or sinned against a parent?

Have we sinned by commission doing things we ought not to? Have we sinned by omission not doing things we ought to do? When we begin to ask those kinds of questions, we begin to see, oh, the people in Mark 15, they look a lot more like us than we think. And the Bible reveals the ugliness of sin. See, one of the things that happens over time is humanity just gets used to sin and we just don't see it in its ugliness anymore.

We kind of are just like, 'Okay, yeah, yeah, well, everybody kind of sins.' But Mark 15, it stands out in its kind of perversity and ugliness that what occurs here should make us cringe, should make us go, 'Oh.' that they would have the Lord, God himself, their creator, their sustainer in front of them, and instead of coming to him, turn away from him. Instead of rejoicing in him, reject him. But the Bible reveals that that is humanity ever since Genesis chapter 3, right? Where God creates the world good and he gives humanity, Adam and Eve, everything. And they're tempted.

And what's the temptation? The temptation is, 'Come eat this one fruit you're not supposed to eat.' And the serpent says, 'And you will be like God.' Right? They have the good rule of God, and yet they choose, 'No, I want to be the ruler. I wanna be in charge.' And that's what every single person does in this text, right? The Sanhedrin are threatened by Jesus and they say, 'No, I want to be God.

I want to be in charge. Pilate says, no, I have to hold on to my power. The crowd says, no, we need to follow the status quo. We need to listen to these scribes, or maybe they're even handing out money. Who knows?

What's best for us is to get rid of him. Every single person makes this exchange.

9 · The pastor applies the mirror to produce humility

Now, if we see this, if we see ourselves where we ought to see ourselves in the Gospel of Mark, I'm going to just drop in one thing that would change for us. And one of the things is, it should produce a profound humility knowing that the road to the cross was necessary because of us.

Right? There's nobody that it was unnecessary for Jesus to walk the road to the cross for. It's not like, 'I'm going to go and die for the sins of the world, except for Jerry. What a guy,' you know? Jerry, thumbs up, you know, and then move on.

Every single person who makes that exchange and continually repeats that exchange needs Jesus to walk the road of the cross for them. And if that's true, brothers and sisters, it should destroy any self-righteousness that lingers with us as Christians. Look, let me— let's be frank. There are far too many arrogant Christians looking out at the world today, shaking their heads, wagging their fingers in self-righteousness, saying, 'I would never, those people,' right? What's that for you when you see that group or that thing, like, 'Those people.' Maybe for you, it's, Seeing a newscast of a political rally that is pro-abortion and you just think, 'Those people, I would never.' Right?

Or maybe it's a certain political bumper sticker that somebody's got on their car. As you're driving behind them in traffic, 'Oh, you, you people.' Right? There's just that in you. The reality is this, brothers and sisters. When we see a sinner in our world around us, we should see ourselves.

We should see that every single person on the face of the earth, including us, would cry out among the scoffers, 'Crucify him!'

10 · The pastor quotes a hymn to reinforce personal culpability for the cross, then pivots to transition toward hope ('But I've got good news for you'), setting up the second main point about the exchange

I think about that old line in the old hymn, 'Ashamed I hear my mocking voice call out among the scoffers. It was my sin that held him there until it was accomplished.' Right? That is true of all of us. And if that is true, the way we approach the world— listen, the way we approach the world goes from this to this, right? We're like, man, it was necessary for Jesus to go to the cross for me. But I've got good news for you.

11 · The pastor steps outside the sermon flow to address media consumption and its effect on the heart

That's point number 1. Point number 2, okay, actually, before number 2, before point number 2, let me just drop this in, okay? If what you read or listen to is contributing to self-righteousness and pride and thinking yourself better than them, let me just encourage you, spend more time in the word than with them, right? I'm talking about political stuff, cultural stuff. You start to listen to a podcast or a newscast and what you realize is happening in your heart is like, Yeah, they're the worst, blah, you know. And look, what's happening around us may be grieving. We may need to take action or we may need to pray or one of a number of things. But if it's just creating self-righteousness and pride that we're better than them, oh, brothers and sisters, we go back to the road to the cross.

We see the crowd, we see Pilate, we see the Sanhedrin, we see ourselves, we find ourselves humble again.

12 · The pastor expounds the Barabbas-Jesus exchange, contrasting their characters and Pilate's expectation of an easy choice

Okay, point number 2, the road for us. There's good news, road for us. We come to one of the most perplexing exchanges in human history, right? Imagine the scene. So Pilate has this custom that once a year or so, he will release a prisoner that the Jewish people want him to release. And he does this kind of like throwing a bone to the people to keep everybody happy. Like, hey, I oppress you for 364 days a year, but one day a year, I let a guy go. And people are like, that's a pretty good guy.

And it pacifies the crowd and keeps everybody like, well, let's not do anything. Maybe he'll release our cousin. And everybody's like, oh yeah, maybe he'll let Fernando out of prison. Let's be nice to him. And we don't really like Fernando, but just hoping that he'll release somebody.

And it's just kind of a gesture, throwing the crowd a bone. And so what Pilate does is he sets up what he thinks is the easiest decision in the history of decisions, to quote the commercial with Charles Barkley. You guys seen that commercial with Charles Barkley where Charles Barkley is— there's a bunch of kids playing basketball that are like 12, and they're picking teams, and it pans over and there's like a 12-year-old, 12-year-old, 12-year-old, Charles Barkley, and a 12-year-old. And so the kids are like, I'm gonna go with Barkley. And Barkley's like, yes, right?

'Cause you realize, if you don't know who Charles Barkley, I seen faces like you don't know who Charles Barkley is. That's concerning to me for two reasons. One, you may not like basketball, and two, it means I'm old. And when all the Gen Z people saw that commercial, they're like, who's the bald guy? All right, well, he's just a tall basketball player, okay?

That's all you need to know for the sake of the commercial. Pilate is setting up what he thinks is the easiest decision ever, okay? On the one hand, you have Barabbas. Now, what you may be tempted to think about Barabbas is that he is just sort of a good-hearted freedom fighter that's trying to fight against Roman oppression like the Maccabees and just, you know, doing the best he can. He's a man of the people and people are like, 'Yeah, I love Barabbas.' Here's the reality though, that kind of helps shape our understanding of Barabbas, okay?

He participated in an insurrection that failed, obviously, that's why he's in jail. So not a very good insurrectionist. And in the insurrection, we know two things about him. One, from John, we learned that he was a robber also. So this isn't like a dude— okay, you know, there's like a dude that's like, we're going to fight for freedom or whatever.

Barabbas' picture is a little bit more self-serving. It's like, yeah, sure, let's destroy some property and we'll grab a little bit on the side, man. You know, like, yeah, down with the Roman Empire. Is that a gold bracelet? I'm going to go ahead and pocket that.

You know, like, And you realize, okay, I think this guy is maybe not great. And then you learn in Mark that he committed murder in the insurrection. The picture we get is not that he's like fighting another Roman soldier, like, hey, that he murdered people.

The picture you begin to get is this is a guy that is not— doesn't have good character. He is an anarchist. He's an insurrectionist in the worst sense. He's a robber.

Murderer. So you have him on one side and then you have Jesus. And so Barabbas takes things from people, but Jesus freely gives of himself. He feeds thousands of people on the fields rather than let them starve. Barabbas takes life from people.

Jesus gives life to people. He heals. He even raises the dead, right? Lazarus is walking around and people are like, 'I thought you died.' And he's like, 'I dead, right? This is the decision.

Do you want the life taker or the life giver? Do you want the person you can't trust for a minute or the person proved himself completely trustworthy? The person that over and over, they looked for Jesus, they looked for flaws or sins or weaknesses, can find nothing. He's completely clean. And he teaches like no one else.

He points the way to God. He brings freedom. Forgiveness and hope wherever he goes. And so Pilate, even he as a Roman who doesn't know anything about the Jewish scriptures, even he sees this guy is innocent. And all he seems to do is care for people and love people and serve people.

So I will stack him up against the worst person in the prison and say, okay, I'll release one of these.

And then the crowd shouts, 'Give us Barabbas.'

13 · The pastor explains why the crowd chooses Barabbas: Jesus' kingship threatens their autonomy

Now, you may think, 'Why?' And again, you may be thinking, 'I would never do that, right? I would always pick Jesus.' Now, remember what we just talked about. In the garden, our first parents make the decision that we all make. Which is living under the good rulership and kingship of God, full of freedom and goodness, or our own reign, us on the throne. And the crowd, I think, in a real sense, everybody involved knows that Jesus really is the king.

And they don't reject him because they aren't sure who he is. They reject him because of who he is, because the reign of Jesus threatens their own reign. That is why the crowd shouts, 'Crucify him!' And here's what they do. They don't just say, 'Okay, well—' because he asked the crowd, 'What do you want to do with Jesus?' And he's open to any number of lesser punishments, knowing that Jesus is innocent. And the crowd goes to the most extreme brutal, humiliating form of death they can dole out.

Watching somebody be nailed to a piece of wood and suffocate over hours in humiliation.

That's what they choose. And again, he says, 'What evil has he done?' And the crowd cannot answer because there is no answer to give. Because he hasn't done any evil. They know one thing though: he threatens their reign. So they cry, 'Crucify him!' And we see a glimpse of the brutality of this exchange in the scourging of of Jesus before he even makes his way to the cross.

Pilate has him scourged in an attempt in some way to pacify the crowd. And this is what that entails. So I want you to understand, in the very moment that they make this exchange, something happens. Barabbas goes free and Jesus goes to this. The scourging, Kent Hughes says, was done by the dread flagellum whip consisting of thongs plated with pieces of bone and lead.

Eusebius tells of martyrs who were torn by scourges down to deep-seated veins and arteries so that the hidden contents of the recesses of their bodies, their entrails and organs, were exposed to sight. Josephus describes this in similar terms. The flagellum left Jesus with bone and cartilage showing. He quotes Isaiah, 'His appearance was so marred beyond human semblance and His form beyond that of the children of mankind. His brow wore the mocking crown of thorns.

A faded purple robe crimson with blood hung dripping from his shoulders.

In this moment, the crowd makes an exchange. They exchange the rulership and kingship of Jesus for their own. They, in a real sense, point to Jesus and say, 'You die for me. You die for me. I have to sacrifice you to continue to rule and reign in my own little world.

14 · The pastor articulates the gospel exchange: humanity says 'You for me' (demanding Jesus' death for our autonomy), and Jesus agrees, saying 'Yes, me for you' (substitutionary atonement)

And here is the amazing heart of the gospel, that while every human makes this exchange, him for me, Jesus incredibly agrees to the exchange in a sense. Jesus, when he hears them say, 'You for me,' replies, 'Yes, me for you.' for you. Jesus makes the exchange, him for us. Isaiah 53 describes Jesus' work this way. But he was pierced for our transgressions.

He was crushed for our iniquities. Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace. With his wounds, we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

This is the exchange, brothers and sisters, at the heart of the gospel, that Jesus Christ— that there would be a Barabbas standing on one side, a sinner, somebody who deserves death, somebody who should rightly walk the road to the cross and Jesus on the other side who only deserves freedom. And essentially Jesus says, I will walk his road for him. I will walk her road for her. Every single Christian, he makes that exchange for. Every blood-bought son and daughter, he makes that exchange for.

Maybe you've been here and you've been like, 'Man, these people sing a lot about the cross. They sing a lot about this exchange. They talk a lot about it.' Yeah, we do, because it is the heart of the gospel.

15 · The pastor expounds the typology embedded in Barabbas' name (son of the father) via notes from Vince

And here is the beauty of Mark. Mark knows this. Mark knows Isaiah. And Mark writes in such a way that before Jesus goes to the cross, he gives us in Jesus and Barabbas a glimpse of what will occur on the cross and a glimpse of what will occur for every blood-bought son and daughter of God. I love that, that our team of elders studies the Bible together. And this week Vince sent me some notes as we were going over the passage together, and his notes were too good not to read. So I'm going to read them.

Come on, this is Vince. You have to imagine his voice preaching this better than me, but He points out the son of the father is the true meaning of Barabbas' name. Bar-abbas, right? The name Abba, you may have heard, Abba Father. Bar-abbas, the son of the father.

The son of the father, this son of the father, Barabbas, was a false son of the father but was set free at the cost of the true Son. Of the Father. In the same way, we false sons who are guilty of cosmic insurrection are set free at the cost of the true Son of the Father. And in the greatest act of grace, we become true sons of the Father. After the exchange, Barabbas got to go home to his family.

Barabbas got to leave the prison. Barabbas got to enjoy the fruits of Jesus being sentenced. And likewise, we get to come home to our true Father. We are set free from the prison of drug abuse and pain and sin. You go on.

We get to enjoy the fruits of Jesus being sentenced.

In that moment, as the exchange takes place and Jesus is led away to be brutally killed, Barabbas' family, I imagine, runs to greet him, and he goes to sleep in his own bed with his own family while Jesus cries out, 'My God, why have you forsaken me?' You see the extent of the exchange. It is endless. It is infinite. The true Son of the Father for the false son of the father. But because of that exchange, incredibly, amazingly, those who are false sons become true sons or can become true sons because of Jesus, can be welcomed home, can be welcomed in by the father.

16 · The pastor issues an evangelistic appeal: the exchange must be personally received through faith

And look, if you're here today and you're not a Christian or Maybe you're in the place of this brother that I was talking to that's recently become a Christian. You gotta understand this. You have to make this exchange. It's held out for you and you are invited to make it, but you must make it. You must acknowledge Jesus as King, repent of your sins and cling to him, believe that he is who he claimed to be, the Son of the Father, and believe the exchange was for you.

And it seems like, okay, that seems like not enough. I should have to go do like a hundred. He's coming from a Catholic background. So he's thinking, I got to go do 100 good deeds, 100,000 good deeds. I got to do this, I got to do that.

And then maybe someday I'll be worth the exchange. No, you can't. What you can do is receive it. It is held out for you today, receive it. Receive it with joy.

17 · The pastor illustrates ongoing wonder at the gospel through Tom Wilkins, who wept every time he preached Jesus

And if you are a Christian, let me just say, look, I think one of the purposes of the Gospel of Mark and one of the uses of Mark as we continue to be Christians year over year over year is that as we walk the steps of the Savior with him, that we continue to be filled with wonder and amazement at what he has done year over year. Tom Wilkins, who's one of our pastors and is being sent out later this month, at the end of this month to— I don't want to think about that, Tom. You're being sent out sometime in the future that we won't think about to serve another sister church. He was my youth leader, he's my singles leader, my pastor, still is my pastor. And one of the things in our singles group is one of the guys that was new to the group called Tom the crying pastor because every time he talked about Jesus, Tom would, like, get emotional.

Even like at his house, right? You know, you might think, okay, well, in the pulpit he'd get emotional. No, just like in his house, he was talking about Jesus and tears would come to his eyes. And I remember Tom preaching through the Gospel of Luke, and I don't remember any of the outlines Tom used. It's not like I remember, oh yeah, point number 3 from that sermon on December 3rd was really, really good.

Here's what I remember about Tom's series in the Gospel of Luke. Week after week after week, week after week, Tom cried as he described what Jesus had done for him. And at some point I thought, 'Okay, we're going to, like, move on and he's going to just kind of stop crying.' And it was every time we saw Jesus almost that he got— tears came to his eyes.

And I was ashamed— I'm ashamed to say that at first I thought it was weakness.

And the older I get, the more I see that he got it far better than me. That if you understand this exchange, oh, brothers and sisters, every year that we continue to fail and fall in different ways, continue to commit sins in different ways, and we go back to the exchange and know that every one of those sins and failures is covered by the blood of Jesus, and it is still— the blood of Jesus is still doing what only it can do, which is to wash our sins away. And the arms of the Father are still open to us because of Jesus. And the house of the Father is still open to us because of Jesus. Every year we live, this exchange should be more strange, more amazing, and more glorious.

18 · The pastor steps aside to address a pastoral concern: the danger of minimizing sin

And look, I'm great. Let me just say this. I'm grateful that in recent years, in the church broadly, we've come to understand that, okay, There are different churches at different times that everything was a sin. You know, like any flaw in your character, anything going on hard in your life, it's like, oh, it's because you're probably sinning, you know. And we've got, I think in a good way, even in our church, begun to understand, okay, that some people really have like clinical anxiety that they're dealing with.

Some people have been sinned against and there's effects in their life because of that. And you begin to understand, okay, people are complicated, that they're sinned against, there's just weaknesses and problems that may not necessarily be a sin. But here's the danger, okay? This is just— this is my burden for us. As we understand that not everything is sin, let's not forget that we really do still sin.

Like, people may sin against us, but we sure sin back. We may have weaknesses, but we sure fail still.

And here's my burden. If we think little of our Savior, it may well be because we think little of our sin. We think, 'I don't have a lot to be forgiven of. I'm pretty great, you know. Jesus is like, 'Ah, love that guy, you know.

Don't need to walk the cross.'' No. All of us, all of us are in the place of Barabbas.

That's my burden.

19 · The pastor introduces the third point: the road with us

Okay, point number 3, and this is the last one, the road with us. Now, this is, stick with me because this is strangely encouraging, okay? At first, it will seem discouraging, but hang in there. One of the reasons I believe Mark lays this out is to help us understand that this road to the cross is the road for every Christian, not in a salvific sense, not that we go to the cross to save ourselves or save somebody else like Jesus, We don't walk the road as far as Jesus does in a sense, but we walk the road of Jesus. Mark 8:33-35 says, 'Calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, 'If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it.'' Meaning Jesus, from the middle of Mark, is calling us to the road of the cross. With him. And remember who's reading this. These are persecuted Christians, people who were opposed by the Jewish authorities, people who were opposed by the Roman authorities, people who may well be reading the Gospel of Mark under the reign of Nero as he burned Christians on crosses for torches to light his palace.

And they are wondering, did we go wrong somewhere? Did we take a left turn somewhere? Is this What happened? I thought Jesus was the one who brought life and light, and all of a sudden, we're in the dark over here. Take heart, the Gospel of Mark says.

The road of Jesus is your road as well. Your road, the road of Jesus, means you're on the right road.

20 · The pastor quotes 1 Peter 4:12-13 to reinforce the thesis: don't be surprised by trials

The Apostle Peter writes in 1 Peter 4:12, beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you as though something strange were happening to you. That's me, this pause. That's me all the time. I'm like surprised. I'm like, oh my gosh, there's a trial. You know, like Peter's just, buddy, do not be surprised. Okay, thank you, Peter. Verse 13, but rejoice insofar, this is an extraordinary line, but rejoice Insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.

Look, we are tempted to be surprised by fiery trials and to think we are on the wrong road, but sometimes it means actually, counterintuitively, that it means we're actually on the right road.

21 · The pastor illustrates the counterintuitive nature of the Christian road through a story of driving to King's Kids

So it was like a couple of years ago, I was trying to get to King's Kids, which is a ministry here in town. Anybody like know from King's Kids? Familiar with King's Kids? Yeah, I love King's Kids. It's a great ministry. And I was out there to meet with some of the folks there, and I hadn't been there in years. And so I'm driving in the Upper Valley.

I don't know if you've been there, but it is not clear where it is, right? You know, you drive by a house and I drove into like a house being built and the workers are looking at me like this. I'm like, it's not that. So I'm driving back and forth multiple times, finally in humility, I call Cam, my friend there that works there, and I'm like, bro, where is this thing? And he describes like, okay, are you by a canal?

And there's kind of a road, like it looks like an access road or something. And he's, and I'm, you know, I'm on that road and I'm like, yeah, but you know, I think, I don't know. And he goes, okay, let me ask you this. Does it look and feel like you're kind of going the wrong way? And I said, yes, it does.

And he says, Good, okay, that's it. Just keep driving down to the end and you'll get there. And sure enough, I felt as though I were going somewhere that I should not be going, the wrong way, and then I arrive, King's Kids, super cool campus, super fun. What's the point? The point is this.

Sometimes as a Christian, you will think, it feels like I'm going the wrong way, right? It feels like I'm going against culture. It feels like all the cars are going this way and I'm going that way. This can't be right. And Jesus says, that's it.

That's the road.

22 · The pastor applies the principle: the road will be rocky and dark, but it's the right road

The road to discipleship is a rocky road. The road of Christian discipleship will be dark at times, but the road of Christ is the right road. And here's the truth. One of the purposes of being on the road to Christ is that the Lord may shape us to look more like Christ. We want to look like Jesus without walking the road of Jesus sometimes, right? Like, 'I want to look like Jesus.

Great. This is the road. Not that one. Don't like that one. Is there a different road?' Here's the truth: soft roads produce soft Christians.

Rugged roads produce rugged Christians.

And the call to Christ is the call to the rugged road.

23 · The pastor declares the gospel hope: the road to the cross is also the road through the cross to resurrection

Road, to take up your cross and follow him. But that doesn't end. It doesn't end there, because the road to the cross is also the road through the cross. Verse 13 in 1 Peter 4 says, 'Rejoice insofar as you share in Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.' Meaning that the road to the cross is the road through the cross and to life and resurrection.

The road of the Christian is the road of Christ. And we know where the road ends.

It's not as though, 'Okay, man, I don't know where this is going to go.' We know where it's going. We know it's hard. But we know that at the end of the road, there is not a grave, but an empty tomb. That the end of the Gospel of Mark is two women coming to the tomb and a shining man in white saying, 'Don't be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth who was crucified.

He has risen. He is not here.' The end of Mark is an empty tomb. The end of Mark is the glorious resurrection of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

And if he walked out of the grave, so will we. That's the end of the road of Christ.

24 · The pastor closes with a final illustration: driving to Sedona in the dark, uncertain and worried, then waking to a glorious mountain vista

Look, let me just tell you a story as we wrap up here. So recently we were trying to drive to Sedona. I'd never been to Sedona in my life. And so we're driving to Sedona and there's kind of a main highway road and then there's kind of another road that's supposed to be faster. And we had kids in the car and we've been in the car all day and it's getting dark and it's dark and it's dark. Finally, it's so dark you can't really see anything. And I'm worried 'cause I'm just like, man, this seems far out in the middle of nowhere.

There's like no cities here and I've never been there. So I'm thinking this is gonna be weird and lame. And I haven't stayed where we're staying and I don't want, and so I'm thinking like, I don't know, maybe we should just stay in Phoenix and try to, you know, see if this is gonna work. And so we finally find the place and it's late at night and all the kids are like grumpy and we get everybody in bed and I'm just exhausted, fall asleep. Wake up in the morning, we have a bunch of trash that we left out, so I bag up the trash, and I'm walking out to take the trash to the dumpster.

And where we were staying is like right on the edge of town to where you could see this mountain vista behind you. Now look, I'm used to looking at mountains, I love the Franklins, I think they're gorgeous. But I had the bag, I forgot that I had a bag of trash in my hand when I saw these mountains. I walk out, I look up, And there is this glorious vista of mountains illuminated by the morning light with stripes and oranges and reds and yellows. And I kid you not, there are like hot air balloons, like going up in the air.

There's a beautiful cloud over. And I'm just thinking, am I dead? Is this it? Lord, you know, died in my sleep. And so I kid you not, I start walking out with the bag of trash in my hand, like, you know, a few dozen feet and realize, oh, I still have this trash.

Like, where's the trash? I'd forgot what I was doing. And the point is this. So often in the Christian life, the road seems dark and the road seems like this can't be right, but morning comes. Will come.

And in the light of the morning, we will look back on the road and think, 'Oh, that was easy. I could do it again.' I remember thinking— it's funny, the drive felt so long to get to Sedona, and then once we were in Sedona, I was like, 'It didn't take that long,' because of what was there.

25 · The pastor summarizes the sermon with two exhortations to remember: (1) Jesus walked the road further than we ever will, making our trials light in comparison; (2) the road of the cross is our road, the right road, and it ends in glory

So, Christian, the road to the cross is your road, but it is a glorious road. It is a road that ends in life. And two things to remember on the road. First, remember that Jesus Christ walked the road further than you ever will for you. He exchanged himself for you.

He went to experience things that you will never have to experience. And in light of that, any bumps or rocks, you know, on the road should be light and, as scripture says, light and momentary affliction. Afflictions, working for us an eternal weight of glory. You're like, man, my destiny was that, and it's over here. I'm good.

Second thing we remember is the road of the cross is our road. It's the right road. If you're in trial this morning, it does not mean God has abandoned you. It doesn't mean you're off the reservation. If you are seeking to follow Christ and it is hard, hang in there.

This is the road of Christ and it ends in glory.

26 · The pastor transitions from the sermon to communion, inviting Christians to participate and non-Christians to observe

So what we're going to do now is we're going to end by taking communion together. And so I want to invite you to take the cup in front of you. And I want you to take just a minute. You can open the cup. If you're a Christian, we invite you to participate with us. If you're not a Christian, we ask you to observe and see the symbolism of what we're doing. We're about to symbolize, in a sense, this great exchange that we've talked about.

27 · The pastor calls the congregation to silent reflection, inviting each person to identify what the Lord is speaking to them from the sermon—humility, wonder, encouragement, or hope

So take the cup in your hand. And I want us to just take a moment. I know our lives are busy. I know we got places to be. But I want you to take a moment and say, Lord, from Mark 15, what are you speaking to me today? What's the one thing you want to impress on me? Is it that I need to be humble, not arrogant, as I look at the road of the cross?

Is it that I should be in awe and wonder, and I'm often not? Is it that I should be encouraged that I'm on the right road? Is it that I should hold on and remember the morning is coming? Whatever it is for you, just take that moment and take that moment with the Lord right now.

28 · The pastor reads the institution of the Lord's Supper from Mark 14, pausing after each element to direct the congregation to partake

Mark 14 says, as they were eating, Jesus took bread and after blessing it, broke it and gave it to them and said, and said, 'Take, this is my body.' Him for us, please take the bread.

And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, and they all drank of it. And he said to them, 'This is my blood of the covenant,' which is poured out for many, him for you. Please take the cup.

29 · The pastor closes with prayer, asking God to do lasting work in hearts, encourage those in affliction, give them experiential assurance of Christ's presence, and call any who are wrestling with the exchange to receive it even now during the closing song

And then please stand as we close. Oh, Lord, I pray that as we leave you would do a work in our hearts that would outlast just the few minutes that we've been here. Lord, I pray for those in affliction that need the encouragement of Mark 15, the encouragement of the Gospel of Mark, that you would encourage them today, that they would feel, even as we sing, in a sense, you coming alongside them, walking the road with them. I pray that they'd experience the presence of Christ and the presence of the Spirit in their lives right now as we close. And Lord, I pray for anyone that for whom the exchange is anew, that they may be wrestling with, man, do I— have I really seen that before?

And wrestling with whether they are a Christian. Lord, I pray that they would press into that. And if you're calling them to receive the gift of this exchange this morning, I pray that they would do it even now, even as we sing. I pray that in your name. Amen.