Injustice Mark 15: 1 – 20 The Cross: The Sign That Things Have Changed.

Today, the cross is often reduced to jewellery – an accessory worn without thought of its true meaning. Yet in Jesus’ day, the cross was not decorative but deadly. It was Rome’s ultimate symbol of power, a tool of fear and humiliation.

If you were reading the lead-up to the cross in Mark 15 for the first time, you may be asking yourself:

• What will happen to Jesus and to God’s kingdom?
• What will happen to God’s rescue operation, to the work Jesus had begun in Galilee?”
• Is it all lost?
• Will evil prevail again?
• Will injustice go unchecked?

Mark shows us that all is not lost:

Firstly, we see how the Kingdom of God comes. We see that Jesus is innocent and silent before Pilate, yet was condemned. This idea points us back to Isaiah 53, which reminds us that God’s chosen servant (Jesus) is the Servant-King and will bring about justice through serving us. That just when all seems lost, just when the innocent seems condemned, that God’s Kingdom breaks into this world to melt our hearts of stone.

Secondly, we see that the values of the Kingdom. Mark reminds us that we see the gospel in miniature in the exchange between Barabbas and Jesus. The guilty one goes free, the innocent one dies.
So what has happened to God’s rescue mission? Has it failed?
No, we are like Barabbas. Jesus takes our place.
The cross, which once shouted Rome’s power, now proclaims God’s grace.
The kingdoms of this earth are becoming the Kingdom of our God.

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