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Mark 9:12-13 – Jesus Didn’t Give Up and Neither Should We
Why should pain and suffering not cause us to become unbelievers? One answer is Jesus.
What I mean is, Jesus suffered more than most humans, and even more in enduring human shame although the holy Son of God. And yet, did Jesus become an atheist? No. Did Jesus become enraged at God? No.
Jesus was poor and uneducated as concerning rabbinical schools and training, and yet is still recognized by most as a masterful, educated, rabbi, and teacher. Jesus was disrespected by those who should have welcomed Him. Despite that, even today most admit he lived an amazingly innocent, unvengeful, forgiving, life. What this means is, Jesus lived an unfair life by human standards. Many might think it unfair by divine standards.
Notice how these two verses sum up richly Jesus’s thought process:
A – ““Elijah does come first and restores all things,” he replied.
B – “Why then is it written that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be treated with contempt?
A’ – But I tell you that Elijah has come,
B’ – and they did whatever they pleased to him, just as it is written about him.”” (CSB’17 Mark 9:12-13)
If John (aka Elijah) restored all things, then that implies something positive. Jesus, having already prophesied his death, then asks a natural question: If John restored things, then why am I about to suffer? Valid question.
Notice, “written” is stated twice connecting these two thoughts (B,B’). What’s Jesus’s point? Doing right, doing good, even doing God’s will and “finishing” our task, does not mean rainbows and sunshine. Sometimes it means the exact opposite. Restoration is painful.
If anyone had a right to give up on God because of being wrongly treated, especially by God’s own people, or even wrongly perceiving how God treated Him, it was Jesus. So why should we not give up? Jesus didn’t. Jesus teaches us a better response.
We can fool ourselves into not believing what we have never seen, that is, God face to face. However, Jesus who had seen, teaches us not to. This is just another example of how Jesus and His gospel is the ultimate answer to the problem of pain.
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