Mark 15:16-32 “The Mocking”

Simon of Cyrene: Mark tells us that he was an innocent by-stander who was pressed into service to carry the Cross of Christ. Again, we know almost nothing about this man except that he was from Africa, because that is where Cyrene is. He was most likely someone who had come to Jerusalem on a Pilgrimage of a lifetime to spend the Passover Feast in the Holy City. He must have been frightened when the Roman soldier approached him to carry the Cross, especially because his two sons were right there with him at the time. Can you imagine if you were asked by a police officer to throw the switch on an electric chair so that a person might die? Could you imagine having a gun pressed into your hand by a soldier? Could you imagine carrying the Cross of the Son of God? And, however you respond to this, your children are watching!

This is a major part of the Christian life that we all have a Cross that we must bear for God in heaven. Jesus himself said that we would all have to pick up the Cross in order to follow him. Let us just quickly read Jesus’ own words in Matthew 16:24-26, “. . . If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who would lose their life for my sake will find it.”

There is a question with Simon of Cyrene: Why didn’t he just slip into crowd and disappear rather than be forced by the soldiers to carry the Cross for Christ? This translates in our faith as the question as to why do we choose to take up the burden of ministry ourselves? Being a Christian is the hardest thing there is to do on this planet! Why don’t we just run the other way?! Why do we try to convince people of the promise of eternal salvation when they seem perfectly content already with their eternal damnation? Why do we try to do what Jesus said and actually love our enemies? Why do we pick up that Cross? Why did Simon of Cyrene when he could have run?

I want to do a little bit of an historical aside here that the whole idea of bearing a cross to the place of crucifixion was part of the humiliation that was meted out before the actual sentence of death. When we read this, we might come up with question, “Why weren’t the crosses for crucifixion already there at the place of crucifixion?” Golgotha was already the designated site for crucifixion there at Jerusalem. Why should they not just leave the crosses up for the next crucifixion?

As I understand it, prisoners were to make their own cross and carry it to the site of their own death. This was part of the total degradation of the person who has been convicted. Yet, wood was scarce in those days, so the crosses would come down, be refitted, and dragged back out by prisoners. We do not have the story of Jesus having to make his own cross, it seems that there was not enough time for this, and it was during the Passover, a Sabbath day, meaning work was not supposed to be done.

Also, historically, the notion that the cross was saved somehow and that pieces of it have been made into relics that now bless various churches around the world probably is not true. The cross would have been reused. By the end of the Middle Ages the theologian Erasmus noted that there was enough “wood of the true cross” to build a large sailing ship.

In the end, we see what this analogy means for us as followers of Christ: The Way is not hop, skip, and a jump through this world and into the next with Jesus! It is picking up and carrying the burden for Christ. THAT is the TRUE cross of Christ over our lives.

Right, back to the Passion of Christ. Simon of Cyrene was remembered by the early church because of his sons. Rufus is said to later become the bishop of Thebes in Greece, and Alexander was also well known. They were witnesses to the crucifixion of Jesus. Can you imagine going into a church and hearing this story being told by Rufus or Alexander that they were young boys and actually saw Jesus and in fact their father carried the Cross of Jesus? What an incredible testimony that would be!

One of the things they would have testified to is that Jesus was offered a little wine to help him through the torture that he is suffering. He refuses. He does not want his senses to be dulled in this moment, but also he has said previously that he would not “drink of this fruit of the vine again until he drinks anew in my Father’s Kingdom.” Mathew 26:29. Please note that the reference is to the “fruit of the vine.” So, he will not take the wine and myrrh as he suffers. He is going to do this completely sober act of dying for our sins.

The mocking continues as he is led out to the plain of skulls, Golgotha, and even on the cross itself. It is hard to imagine that if you were on the cross next to Jesus with your life ebbing out of you that you would take a sardonic moment to mock the person dying next to you. I think that this is really insane that the criminals on wither side of Jesus in their last moments on earth choose to mock the Son of God.

I liken this to the people going down on the Titanic. All the lifeboats are gone and the bow of the ship is going under. You rush to the stern of the ship for a last few moments before facing drowning and hypothermia. But before you die, you turn to the person next to you, point out with your index finger, and sneer mockingly, “Haha, you’s gonna die!”

Jesus takes this in. This is also part of the world’s sin that will die with him on the Cross. Mark does not tell the conversion story of one of the bandits that is told in the Gospel of Luke. Yet, just the same even without the penitence that we would hope for when facing death, we are confronted with the question: “What happens when these guys on either side of Jesus meet Him again in the afterlife?” We cannot share this text without wondering! If one mocks Jesus, what happens to that person? It cannot be good.

They mock Jesus with the words “If you are the Son of God, why can’t you save yourself?!” Do you see that in verse 31? In this question is the very heart of our faith! In other faiths, the emphasis is on saving yourself. If you are a Muslim, you try to commit to an act that will save you to heaven. If you blow yourself up as a martyr, then you get forty virgins in heaven in your harem. Right? In Buddhism you try to break the Karmic cycle in order to land in Nirvana, but that is completely up to you. So, you get the idea.

In Christianity, we start by acknowledging that there is absolutely nothing we could do on our own in this world that would lift us up to God. There is no human action that could equal the divine mercy of God. If we go to heaven, it is only because God wants us to be in heaven. WE cannot ourselves but rather rely on the mercy and grace of God. Only God can take death from us. That is why we confess to Jesus in heaven.

Could Jesus have come down off the cross if he wanted to? Well, He changed water into wine, took a few a fish and loaves of bread and fed five thousand, brought Lazarus bake from the dead after four days, walked on water, and the list goes on. Sure, Jesus was fully capable of coming back down off the cross. So, why didn’t he? If he had, then those two robbers who were mocking him at that moment could not have been saved. We could not be saved. And, God wants to save us through His Son Jesus Christ.

This just reminds me of that time I was out swimming laps in the ocean, minding my own business, when all of the sudden I got in the head by a windsurfer’s board. I was just dazed in the water for a few seconds as I realized what had just happened. I was lucky not to have been knocked unconscious. Then, as I regained my wits, I realized that there was another body struggling in the water next to me. The person who had struck me in the head was drowning a few feet away. I swam over to her and pulled her back to the windsurfer board.

I asked her if she were okay. Yup, but she confessed that she really did not know how to swim. I noted to her then it would be even more important for her to use the leg strap provided on the rental board. She said that she did not know how to windsurf either. And, so she thanked me for saving her life.

So, thank you Jesus for saving my life, even though I hurt you! It was my sin that put you on the Cross. Yet, you saved me. I thought I could do it myself, but I was a fool. I cannot save myself. So, I should only swim at your life-guarded beach.

Amen.