This is the story of three trials. The trial of Peter. The trial of Jesus. The trial of each one of us. Find out who is guilty and who is innocent; who is condemned and who is pardoned.

For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God...For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

"What comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person." (ESV)

Roman people wanted to know how a person died, not simply how they lived. That is why Mark tells the story of the Roman centurion who stood facing Jesus at the cross. When he saw how Jesus died, he confessed that Jesus was a Son of God. But Mark does something that Graeco-Roman biographers didn’t do: he tells the story of Jesus’ glorious life after hideous death.

And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.

They went on from there and passed through Galilee. And he did not want anyone to know, for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, “The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him. And when he is killed, after three days he will rise.” But they did not understand the saying, and were afraid to ask him.

“Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”

Can God love a faith that doubts? Come and see how Jesus deals with a believing-yet-doubtful father.