Every so often, I am reminded of the great general evangelical failure to discern the primary spiritual nature of the Kingdom of God. While there are aspects of Christ's second coming where the vocally strident premillennial camp are half right - there still remains a general misunderstanding of what the Messiahship of the Anointed One means. Mark's arrangement of Peter's own misunderstanding (in the context of verses thirty-one to thirty-three), with that of the progressive healing of the blind man in this chapter should give us a hint concerning the real Messiahship of our Lord and Savior. To bring out the relationship of the verses in this chapter, I purposely preached on verses thirty-one through thirty-eight two weeks ago. Yes, that message did fit better with the communion service, but unless we understand where today's passage ends up, we are apt to make the same mistake as Peter and much of the rest of the evangelical church.

Remember, these are the sermon notes of the Apostle Peter that Mark has arranged after spending some years with him. We should be suitably impressed with the absolute honesty of Mark's recording since Peter shows in these reports how blind and stupid he personally was before the resurrection. Certainly, there is a general chronology in the outline of the book, but the individual portions do not necessarily have to happen in the order arranged by Mark. However, the order of the portions does apparently have a poignant purpose as we see in the juxtaposition of these two events.

First, let us look today at the details of this particular miracle. Dr Keener tells us that: "This is the only two-stage healing in the Gospels ... This narrative is therefore significant and probably represents an acted parable.... [much like] The Old Testament prophets [who] sometimes acted out parables to get people's attention and communicate their point." And so we hear the aged Apostle report through Mark this interesting lesson. At first the man can only half see images of tree-like humans moving before him. Then Jesus touched him again and his sight was complete. Of course, as we have seen from earlier accounts, the man is asked to keep quiet about the healing until the proper time when the miracle can be reported as evidence that this Rabbinic Healer was more than who He was thought to be.

The next verse builds upon this miracle by way of illustration. Here in His conversation with the disciples, Jesus hears them admit that they see something about Him that they don't quite understand completely. Certainly, Peter gets the title of Anointment correctly, but as we know from the next portion of Scripture, he misunderstands the purpose of the Messiahship of Jesus. Like all to many evangelicals and especially the Jews of Christ's time, it was supposed that an earthly kingdom would be set up by the Lord's Anointed.

"Who do men say that I am?" Jesus asks the little band of disciples. Calvin tells us that: "The design of Christ was, to confirm his disciples fully in the true faith, that they might not be tossed about amidst various reports, as we shall presently see. This inquiry does not relate to the open enemies of Christ, nor to ungodly scoffers, but to the sounder and better part of the people, who might be called the choice and flower of the Church."

"John the Baptist", is the first answer from the lips of the disciples. "Elijah;" or "one of the prophets."

Calvin continues his assessment: "Those only are mentioned by the disciples who spoke of Christ with respect; and yet, though they aimed at the truth, not one of them reaches that point, but all go astray in their vain fancies. Hence we perceive how great is the weakness of the human mind; for not only is it unable of itself to understand what is right or true, but even out of true principles it coins errors. ... We see too how one error quickly produces another; for a preconceived opinion, which had taken a firm hold of the minds of the common people, that souls passed from one body to another, made them more ready to adopt this groundless fancy."

Dr Keener tells us that the fact of the common crowd ranking Jesus among the prophets was radical indeed, since many of the Palestinian Jews understood that the prophets in the Old Testament sense had ceased. Even today, the Muslim cult fancies that Jesus was only just one of the prophets, thus giving Him only a small portion of the respect and adoration to which He is entitled. Neither do any of the other worldly religions go any further. To the pagan world at large, Jesus is just one voice amongst many.

"But who do you say that I am?" Calvin notes that: "Here Christ distinguishes his disciples from the rest of the crowd, to make it more fully evident that, whatever differences may exist among others, we at least ought not to be led aside from the unity of faith. They who shall honestly submit to Christ, and shall not attempt to mix with the Gospel any inventions of their own brain, will never want the true light. But here the greatest vigilance is necessary, that, though the whole world may be carried away by its own inventions, believers may continually adhere to Christ. As Satan could not rob the Jews of the conviction which they derived from the Law and the Prophets, that Christ would come, he changed him into various shapes, and, as it were, cut him in pieces. His next scheme was, to bring forward many pretended Christs, that they might lose sight of the true Redeemer. By similar contrivances, he continued ever afterwards either to tear Christ in pieces, or to exhibit him under a false character. Among the confused and discordant voices of the world, let this voice of Christ perpetually sound in our ears, which calls us away from unsettled and wavering men, that we may not follow the multitude, and that our faith may not be tossed about amongst the billows of contending opinions."

Here in this question the rubber meets the road, unless your tires are about to be recalled! And it is still possible for our theological tread to come unglued even if we select the correct answer, which Peter of course does guess rightly. "You are the Christ", Peter announces. Perhaps you think I am too harsh on poor old Peter, in apologizing for his misunderstanding that immediately in the verses following gets him into some theological trouble. So is the temptation for us all - to misunderstand just who we are dealing with in this God/Man Jesus Christ.

As a more talented scholar than I has put it, we must make up our minds about one of four things concerning the Christ. Now remember, the words Messiah, Christ and Lord's Anointed are all the same thing, so that you do not get confused.

A. First of all, the man Jesus could be crazy, like some of the individuals in:
our mental institutions., sincere no doubt in their mental delusions.

B. Second, the man Jesus could just be a con-artist - taking in the theological:
and emotional cripples of many ages.

C. Third, Christ could well be a person of the Triune God of heaven and :
earth, who set His glory by to come to earth for the benefit of those people :
He would call unto Himself.

D. Fourth, while Jesus was a divine messenger from God, the early Church::
made more of Him than He really was.

[Note: I've taken the liberty to add a fourth proposition from personal expeience.]

Oh how much the world would like choice number A or B or D to be correct. Remember, it is not just a million dollars riding on your choice! Eternity hangs in the balance, your answer determines where you will spend all of eternity. You can't stop at the $1,000 or $32,000 level and ignore the most important question in all of life. You can't take your fortune, however great or small it is with you."But who do you say that I am?" You, like Peter don't have to have the correct answer today, if you will learn and listen to Him day by day and week by week in your Bible reading. Peter, got the answer half right, went on to argue with and even deny the answer, but by God's perfect Grace was restored to ministry as an Apostle of the spiritual Kingdom of God.

The liberal church usually chooses answer B or D, I have read comment after comment over the years accusing the church of fabrication. The worldly assume a certain madness of delusional thinking of everything religious and thus miss out on the Grace given through the Gospel Truth.

Well, what is your personal answer? Would you like a life line, then take time to ask someone you know, love and trust - "Who is Jesus Christ?" You could certainly poll the audience here today, but I wouldn't poll the general population, because only about a third of the people really know the whole truth of the story. Will it help if I take away two of the answers? Let's take away answers A and B, since the historical evidence is so overwhelming that those who wrote the Gospels and Letters of the New Testament based their observations upon what they saw and that their writings were supported by over five hundred people who saw the risen Lord of all the earth.

Thus you are left with either the Gospel truth of answer C, or the hapless and hopeless conclusion that the very people who became better persons than they might have been are living a complete lie in answer D. Yes, we know that there are very many hypocrites within the Church of Christ. There are those who have guessed the right answer to the question of the ages and hung around the church because they enjoy the fellowship, traditions and idea of a savior.

But then again, we are all born blind, dumb and stupid like the disciples who by Mark's account must have their spiritual vision fine tuned by the Lord of all the earth. Only with the help of the Holy Spirit may any one of us know who Jesus the Christ really is. Peter, is getting close, but it will take the resurrection to finally convince him and the others. And even as Jesus describes what must come to be, Peter will initially argue against the divine plan of salvation.

Open our eyes Lord Jesus, show us by the power of your Spirit that you are indeed God incarnate, come to earth to die on the cross that we might spend eternity with you. Show us the truth of the Gospel. Would you really like to spend eternity with the Creative Triune God? Than the only correct answer is that Jesus is indeed the Lord's Anointed Messiah. May you make Him your Lord and Savior and may He reveal Himself to you. Amen.