Lecture Title - Embracing the Cross: Scriptural Patterns and the Challenge of Discipleship in Mark

In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus calls his followers to embark on a transformative journey marked by suffering and self-sacrificial service, with the promise of a glorious future beyond immediate perception. This journey is central to the concept of discipleship in Mark; without it, discipleship doesn’t work. But Jesus’s call to deny yourself and take up your cross may seem foreign, unappealing, or irrelevant in contemporary contexts. We may even wonder if suffering is truly essential to discipleship, or if it is, what it entails. To address these issues, we will explore how Mark employs familiar scriptural stories as patterns to explain the experiences of Jesus and his followers. Ultimately, we will discover how these story-patterns can help us to a renewed understanding and practice of discipleship today.

Elizabeth E. Shively (PhD Emory University) is Professor of Christian Scriptures at George W. Truett Theological Seminary, Baylor University. In addition to her academic scholarship, she frequently preaches and teaches in churches and conference settings. She is the author of multiple books, including Apocalyptic Imagination in the Gospel of Mark (de Gruyter, 2012).

The Henry Center for Theological Understanding provides theological resources that help bridge the gap between the academy and the church. It houses a cluster of initiatives, each of which is aimed at applying practical Christian wisdom to important kingdom issues—for the good of the church, for the soul of the theological academy, for the sake of the world, and ultimately for the glory of God. The HCTU seeks to ground each of these initiatives in Scripture, and it pursues these goals collaboratively, in order to train a new generation of wise interpreters of the Word—lay persons and scholars alike—for the sake of tomorrow’s church, academy, and world.

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