By John Warren

 

Have you been with a four year old lately? If you have, you have been bombarded with questions.

Four year olds want to know about everything.

One source says they ask 300 questions a day, interspersed with another one word question, “why?” that is asked 600 times.

Being a pastor, I spend a lot of time in the Bible but it is usually focused on preparing for a sermon, a class or an article such as this one.

On a rare occasion I get to set down with the Bible and read the whole Gospel of either Matthew, Mark, Luke or John.   When you sit down and read through Mark’s gospel you find it divides almost evenly into two halves the first eight chapters then the second eight.

I took my mother to Branson, Missouri and we rode one of those Ducks amphibious tourist attractions which starts off on a land tour then the second half is on the water. My mother was in her late 80’s and she volunteered to drive which she did much better on water than on land! Last week one of those Ducks began its trip on Table Rock Lake and it was calm but then half way through the tour on water a storm came up and everything changed.

This is what happens in Mark.

The first eight chapters are full of life and stories as Jesus moves from town to town. But midway through the eighth chapter things take a dark turn, it’s like a storm coming on the lake. You can feel the mood change danger fills the air and Jesus talks about talks suffering and how it will not be easy for those who are following him. He talks about dying. In fact the last eight chapters are dominated with death talk.

It was a turning point time in Jesus life with his disciples so he got them away from the crowds and sat down to talk.

It was then that he asked them a most important question. “Who do you, my closest friends say that I am?”

It was an important question because it set the groundwork for what he would call them to do which was to be his disciples to carry on his mission after he had gone. And that is the same question each one of us have to answer for ourselves and for the future of our people.

If you can answer that question you know who your is your Savior and what he calls you to do.

 

John Warren is Senior Pastor at First United Methodist Church, 502 North 6^th Street in Orange.