What happened to the disciples after Jesus was raised from the dead? We continue the story of the first Easter this week and find the disciples hiding in a locked room, afraid—afraid of the Jews but even more unsettled by the news of Jesus’ resurrection. The disciples’ reaction (especially Thomas’s reaction) is illustrative for you and me: what will it take for us to believe God’s promises, to trust God’s Word, to follow Jesus as his disciples? Join us this week as we continue to celebrate the Resurrection of Christ.

This Sunday is Easter and we will finally conclude our study in the Gospel of Mark with Mark's account of the Resurrection of our Lord. We began our study on January 8, 2023, and have returned to it each spring. I trust that these four years of study about the life and work of Jesus have not just informed your mind but have also enlarged your heart, helping you worship and follow Jesus as his disciple. In our last sermon of the series, we’ll see that the earliest disciples found faith as hard as we sometimes do. But Jesus went before them, preparing them for their sacred calling to be his witnesses to the world. He goes before you and me too, preparing us for the callings on our life that we will fulfill until he comes again to restore all things.

In the church calendar, today is both Palm Sunday and Passion Sunday, a day where we remember both Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem and his redeeming suffering on the cross. The tension between these two images of Jesus—hailed as King by the crowds but mocked as King by Pilate and others—is instructive for us. It makes us confront our own expectations of King Jesus: what does he look like? What does his kingdom look like?

The pace of Mark’s storytelling—already fast compared to the other Gospel writers—spicing up. Jesus is taken from the Garden of Gethsemane to the home of the High Priest for a hasty trial before the Jewish religious leaders. Peter, meanwhile, has followed at a distance and is trapped by accusations that he was one of Jesus’ disciples. Both Jesus and Peter undergo a trial of sorts, both are condemned, but only one is innocent. Join us this Sunday as we study Mark 14:53-72 and draw closer and closer to the cross.

In January 2020, a small group from Redeemer visited Israel. One of the most moving places for me to visit was the Garden of Gethsemane. The area lies at the foot of the Mount of Olives. You can look across a small valley to the ancient city of Jerusalem. The Temple Mount is clearly visible. It was there on the night before Jesus died that his disciples heard something extraordinary: they heard Jesus ask to be relieved of his divine mission. I say they heard because it was customary then to pray out loud. The reports of Jesus’ prayer that are passed down to us in the Gospels are eye witness accounts. Peter, Andrew, and John heard Jesus wrestling with God in the face of impending doom. This week, we traverse that same holy ground and wrestle ourselves with Jesus’ agony in the face of great trial. As we do, we are brought to our knees in wonder and love for a Savior who knowingly drank the cup of God’s wrath for us.

On the night Jesus was betrayed, he established the Lord's Supper (communion) as a sign of the New Covenant for his people. He intended his church to celebrate this meal until he partakes of it with us after his return. This Sunday we will explore our theology of the table, focusing on its background, the nature of its gift, and the calling of its participants.

It’s important to remember that the Gospels are both the inerrant word of God and a carefully constructed narrative full of dramatic contrasts. Nowhere is this more evident than in Mark 14 and the contrast between Judas the disciple and Mary the sister of Jesus’ friend Lazarus. They are both totally devoted to…different things! This sermon we’ll explore the differences between them, the difference it makes to their relationship with Jesus, and the example each are to us as Jesus’ disciples today.

Our text this Sunday, Mark 13 (and the parallel texts in Matthew 24 and Luke 21), is among some of the most difficult to understand in the Bible. Jesus appears to mix predictions of things that would occur during the lifetime of the disciples with things that would only occur at the very end of human history. Although we won’t have time to unravel all of the exegetical complexities of Mark 13 this week, we should be able to know and understand enough to stay awake, to be ready for our Lord’s Second Coming, and to live lives of faithful expectation.

We return to the book of Mark and conclude Mark 12- where Jesus's authority has been systematically challenged by the leaders of this day. In doing so, we will see how from v. 28-44, Jesus is shown to be the Lord of the law, the Confounder of the Wise and the Judge of True Virtue.

Message from Rev. Dr. Richard Lints on February 8, 2026