There is an old story called the magic mask. It is about a
powerful lord who ruled over a great domain who became so
hard and cruel that ugly lines deepened into his face. On a
tour of his country one day he saw a surprisingly beautiful
girl, and he longed to take her as his wife. But he was
appalled as he looked into the mirror and saw the hard and
cruel lines in his face. He could never win her love with such
a face, and so he called for a magician to make him a mask of
thin wax that would make him look kind and loving. The
artist agreed to do it if he promised to pray daily to the God
of love to change his heart and make him loving toward his
subjects. He said he would and the mask was made. The
lovely girl became his wife, and they enjoyed a remarkable
period of peace and prosperity. He became a truly loving
ruler, and the people marveled at the change in him.
He finally became so bothered by his deception of the wife
he loved so dearly that he begged the magician to remove the
magic mask. It was with fear and trembling that he then
went to the mirror. But to his delight he did not need the
mask any longer because the ugly lines on his face were gone.
His changed heart and spirit had changed his face, and he
had a loving face even without the mask.
We all have to wear a mask at times to hide the ugliness of
our negative spirit. If we let people see all that we are all of
the time, it would not be a pretty sight, and so we mask
ourselves and put on a good front that is pleasant and
acceptable. In contrast to many Halloween masks that are
put on to scare people with their grotesque faces, we put on a
mask to protect people from the real scariness in us. Only
God can see us totally naked in our soul and still love us. We
need to mask some of who we are to be acceptable on the
human level. So wearing a mask of some sort is very
common.
The proof of this is that Jesus Himself, the sinless Son of
God, wore a mask. Jesus hid His identity as long as He
could, and did so in a very conspicuous manner. The first
thing we need to do to get to the bottom of this mystery of the
Master's mask is to establish that there is, in fact, a mystery.
Let's begin by looking at-
1. THE REALITY OF THE MASK.
The first hint we have of this mask is the encounter Jesus
has with the demonized man in the synagogue. When the
evil spirit in this man cried out at Jesus, "I know who you
are-the Holy One of God," Jesus did not say, "Speak up, this
is just the kind of publicity I need right now." Instead, He
said, "Be quiet!" Other translations have it, "Shut up!" He
stopped this positive testimony to His identity, and cast the
evil spirit out. Now if this was just an isolated incident we
could ignore it and not try to read anything into it of
significance. But this was just the beginning of a pattern
Jesus followed.
Notice verse 34: "And Jesus healed many of various
diseases. He also drove out many demons, but He would not
let the demons speak because they knew who He was." I can
see if He would not let them speak because they didn't know
what they were talking about, but it says He would not let
them because they did know what they were talking about.
The demons could identify Jesus, and so He stopped them,
for He was not ready to take off His mask and be known for
who He was.
Even two such mysterious incidents could be over looked
as a possible idiosyncrasy of Mark, but when we see Jesus
going out of His way many times to protect His identity, then
we have to face up to the reality of His mask. Look at verses
43-45. Jesus had just cured a man of leprosy. It was a
marvelous miracle, and one that could bring a lot of
publicity. But note the response of Jesus. "Jesus sent him
away at once with a strong warning." Note, it was not a
polite suggestion, it was a strong warning. And the warning
was, "See that you don't tell this to anyone."
You would think that whatever His reason for trying to
keep His identity a secret, that those whom He healed would
be grateful enough to cooperate with Him. But one of the
paradoxes of the Gospel account is these very people that
Jesus warned and begged to keep His secret were the biggest
blabber mouths in His life. This man went out and spread the
word and the result was Jesus could no longer enter a town
openly. He had to stay out in lonely places it says. His life
was negatively affected by this very man who received new
life from Him. Jesus did him life's biggest favor, and in
return he made life miserable for Jesus.
But the mystery is, why did Jesus want to keep His
identity a secret so bad that He worked at it overtime? We
will try to solve this mystery after we demonstrate beyond a
shadow of a doubt the reality of the mystery of the Master's
mask. We have only looked at the first chapter. What if we
can show that Jesus kept up this battle to hide His identity
over and over again? Let's look at chapter 3:11-12. "When
ever the evil spirits saw Him they fell down before Him and
cried out, you are the Son of God. But He gave them strict
orders not to tell who He was."
Jesus was perpetually trying to keep evil spirits from
telling who He was. Evil spirits were especially a threat
because they knew His identity perfectly. The mask did not
fool them at all. His whole incarnate body did not hide from
them the reality that He was the eternal Son of God. He had
to use His authority as Lord over the spirits to keep their
mouths shut and maintain His secret. People were guessing
all sorts of things about Jesus. Some said He was John the
Baptist, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets. In spite of all the
blabber mouth spirits Jesus was succeeding to fool everybody
with His mask.
Jesus has just raised a little girl from the dead, and all
who saw it were astonished and we read in 5:43, "Jesus gave
them strict orders not to let anyone know about this.." In
this case Jesus was able to suppress His wonder working
power. It is one of the few occasions where He succeeded to
get the cooperation of others. But look at 7:36, where after
He healed a deaf man, it says, "Jesus commanded them not
to tell anyone. But the more He did so, the more they kept
talking about it."
Jesus had a terrible time trying to keep His mask on. But
in spite of almost consistent disobedience to His wishes, He
was able to keep people guessing. They did not really know
who Jesus was. Elijah or one of the prophets were popular
guesses, but then one day Jesus asked Peter who do you think
I am? Peter gave his great confession in Mark 8:29: "You
are the Christ." Peter was the first to acknowledge that
Jesus was the Messiah. He saw beneath the mask of this
wonder worker, and knew this was the Messiah. You would
think Jesus would then end His masquerade, but not so. In
the very next verse Mark 8:30 we read, "Jesus warned them
not to tell anyone about Him."
This was no game with Jesus. He has been very seriously
avoiding exposure of His true identity through His whole
ministry. One of the greatest mysteries of the life of our Lord
is that He was the primary hindrance to people knowing He
was the long awaited Messiah. Don't blame the devil for this
or his demons. Don't blame the Pharisees or the fickle
masses. The facts are clear: Jesus wore a mask and
prevented the knowledge that He was the Messiah from
spreading. What few people did come to that conclusion, He
warned to keep quiet. All the demons that would have
proclaimed it, He silenced. The number one cause why Jesus
was never received by Israel as their Messiah was Jesus
Himself. His disciples were instructed to keep it quiet. Now
if this is not a mystery to beat all mysteries, I don't know
what a mystery is. There can be no question about the
reality of the Master's mask. But now we need to seek an
answer to this mystery, and look at-
II. THE REASON FOR THE MASK.
It is real all right, but why in the world would the Messiah
Himself be the primary suppresser of the good news that the
Messiah had arrived? He was the answer to millions of
prayers, and now that all these prayers were finally
answered, Jesus would not let the people know by taking off
His mask and proclaiming, "Look! It's me, the Messiah!"
He never did that, and it was all clearly a part of a
pre-conceived plan.
It was His intention that only a few would ever see behind
His mask and know without a doubt that He was the
Messiah. He only took Peter, James, and John up to the Mt.
of Transfiguration where they saw Jesus glow with the light
of deity, and talk with Moses and Elijah, and hear the voice
of God saying, "This is my Son whom I love. Listen to Him."
None but these three had such clear evidence of who Jesus
was, but they were not allowed to share this unique
experience with anyone. Mark 9:9 says, "As they were
coming down the mountain, Jesus gave them orders not to
tell anyone what they had seen until the Son of Man had
risen from the dead." The next verse says they kept the
matter to themselves. The secret of Jesus was to be kept until
after His resurrection, and so His own disciples were
muzzled.
Obviously we are dealing with a major strategy in the
whole purpose of Christ coming into this world. Keeping His
identity a secret is a vital part of the plan of salvation. And it
really does make sense when you think about it. If Jesus
would have taken off the mask and let the whole world know
the truth of who He was, there is no way He could have ever
been sacrificed for our sins. No Jew could ever dream of
killing the Messiah. If He had permitted this message to be
broadcast over the land, He would have been followed with
such enthusiasm that there would be no chance of Him being
despised and rejected of men, and offered as the Lamb of
God for the sin of the world. Even the Pharisees and
Saducees would have been willing to die for Him.
So Jesus had to do what the Messiah was to do and fulfill
the Old Testament prophecies. Yet, at the same time keep it
hidden that He was, in fact, the Messiah. What we have here
is the mystery of concealed revelation. He was ever revealing
that He was the Messiah by doing what only the Messiah
could do, yet ever keeping it a secret that He was the
Messiah. He was like the Lone Ranger, and people were
always wondering, who is that masked stranger. Jesus never
took off the mask, and so there was always the mystery in
people's minds: Yes He seems like the Messiah, yet we do not
know if He really is. He does not say I am the Messiah. He
seems like He might be, yet maybe He isn't. This was Jesus
succeeding as the popular, yet hidden Messiah.
Why such a strange strategy? It was the only way Jesus
could have it both ways. He could be the Messiah, and yet be
also the suffering servant who would die for the sin of the
world. It was cleverness on the highest level. Jesus had to
work hard for the chance to die for us. The demons sought
to destroy the plan of God by trying to expose Jesus.
Disobedient people also tried to foul up His plan by their
spreading the news that He must be the Messiah.
Fortunately, His disciples did cooperate with Jesus, and they
went along with the secret. This seems so crazy. The demons
were preaching the deity of Christ, and the disciples were
suppressing it, and it all makes sense. If Jesus would have
become only the Messiah of Israel, He could not have become
the Savior of the world.
So what we have here is Jesus sacrificing the good for the
better. He had to wear His mask and keep His identity as
Messiah a secret in order to achieve a far greater goal of
being the redeemer of the whole lost race of man. If Jesus
had had the limited goal of saving only Israel, then none of
this mystery would have been necessary. He would have
proclaimed Himself Messiah, and the story would not have
ended in death and resurrection, but in an earthly kingdom
for the people of Israel with Jesus as their king.
I have read some authors who say the reason that did not
happen is because the Jews rejected Jesus as their Messiah.
But the facts are, that did not happen because Jesus rejected
that limited kingdom. The scope of His salvation was not
limited to Israel, but His love went out to all the world. He
had no intention of being a king of the Jews only. He
intended to be kings of all kings, and be Lord of all peoples.
That was His goal all through His life, and that is why He
wore the mask and refused to settle for anything less than
being the Savior of the world.
No wonder the demons would have loved to derail His
salvation plan by getting the Jews to go wild over Jesus as
their Messiah. If they could have limited Jesus to one
segment of the human race, they would have won the largest
portion for hell. Jesus refused to allow them to interfere, and
so the first thing He did with demons was to shut them up
when they exalted Him for who He really was. They tried to
take off His mask, but they did not succeed. Jesus was able
to remain hidden enough so that He made it to the cross.
The cross was the reason for all the mystery of the mask.
The failure of the leaders of Israel to receive Jesus as their
Messiah was not a frustration of the purpose of Christ, but a
fulfillment of His purpose. The cross was the goal of Jesus in
all that He did. It takes the very mind of God to figure out
how to become amazingly popular, and yet still be hated
enough to be crucified. It takes divine cleverness to be able
to fulfill all the prophecies of the Messiah, and yet still keep
people in dark about it so you can be rejected and fulfill an
even greater plan.
When Jesus prayed on the cross, "Father forgive them for
they know not what they do," He was expressing the success
of His mask. Nobody but a few disciples knew that He was
really the Messiah. Those who crucified Him did not know
even though Jesus clearly fulfilled all prophecy. He revealed
that He was the Messiah, yet He also concealed it, and,
therefore, they never realized they were crucifying their own
Messiah.
None but the wisest can both reveal and conceal a thing at
the same time, but that is what Jesus did. It was essential to
His plan of salvation. Paul confirms this in I Cor. 2:7-8.
"...we speak of God's secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been
hidden and that God destined for our glory before time
began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if
they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory."
In other words, without the mask Jesus wore He never would
have made it to the cross. Your salvation and mine, and that
of the whole family of God depended upon this mysterious
mask of the Master. We have been saved by a masked man.
Jesus fought through His whole ministry to prevent the
good from robbing Him of the best. If He became too
popular, and if too many people would have acknowledged
Him as the Messiah, it could have ruined His greater goal.
He had to avoid fulfilling the dreams of the Jews in order to
fulfill His own dream of being the Lamb of God that takes
away the sin of the world. Sometimes that dream was
hanging by a thread as the people tried to take Jesus by
storm and make Him king. He had to use His supernatural
power to avoid that kind of popular uprising.
Don't ever waste your emotional energy feeling bad that
Jesus was never accepted as Israel's Messiah. The reason He
wasn't was He fought it with all the cleverness and power of
His divine mind. He masked His Messiahship, and all the
power of hell could not rip that mask off, try as they did.
Satan's only hope of maintaining control of the earth and
mankind was to prevent the cross. This is the hidden battle
that is going on all through the life of our Lord. Satan was
trying to get Jesus limited to a earthly lordship where Satan
would still be in control. Satan wanted Jesus to be the most
popular man in Israel. Leap from the temple and let the
people carry you to power. Bow down to me and receive
power over the nations. Satan wanted Jesus to take off the
mask and let it be known He was the Messiah. This was the
point of all the temptations, and Jesus had to fight constantly
to keep His mask on.
This explains those mysterious sayings of Jesus about His
parables. Jesus had a paradoxical purpose in His teaching
with parables. He told them in order to make truth simple to
understand, and at the same time make truth so obscure that
people could not understand. The parables were part of His
mask. Listen to Mark 4:11-12."He told them the secret of
the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on
the outside everything is said in parables so that they may be
ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never
understanding..."
Jesus explained His parables to His disciples so that they
could understand them, but they were puzzles and riddles to
the leaders of Israel. This was not by accident, but by plan.
Had they understood, they would have make Him their
Messiah. Jesus kept them confused and puzzled on purpose
to fulfill His greater plan for the whole world. Whose fault
was it that Jesus was not accepted as Israel's Messiah? It
was His own fault, for this was His plan. Anybody who hates
Jews for rejecting Christ and crucifying Him has a screw
loose somewhere, for this is the way Jesus planned it. You
just as well hate Jesus for getting Himself crucified, for He
planned it, and then cleverly orchestrated His whole ministry
to make sure it happened. If you want to blame anybody for
the cross, blame Jesus, for He had a thousand chances to
escape it by removing His mask. But He kept it on to be our
Savior.
Which would you rather have Jesus be: The Messiah of
Israel or the Savior of the world? By means of His
mysterious mask He became both, and the result is both Jews
and Gentiles can forever say, Thank God for that masked
man who outwitted the subtle serpent and the wisdom of men
to be our Savior. He avoided the limited destiny that others
would have forced on Him to fulfill that greater destiny His
Father had planned for Him, that He might be King of kings
and Lord of lords with a name above all others.
So much of the life of Jesus is explained by solving the
mystery of the mask. I use to look at Jesus before Pilate and
wonder why Jesus did not speak up in His defense. Why be
silent when you can speak out and do a miracle and reveal
your power? It never made sense to me that Jesus would be
so passive when so much injustice was happening. But now I
see, for Jesus would not let all the power of hell make Him
remove His mask, for that was the key to His getting to the
cross.
Jesus could have made Himself King of Israel with no
problem. He could have had the Pharisees and Saducees
bowing to Him and swearing allegiance. If Jesus had wanted
no higher goal than to be the Messiah of Israel, He could
have easily achieved that ambition. But Jesus chose to
sacrifice that goal to be the Savior of the world.
He had one last chance as He hung dying on the cross. He
could have called legions of angels to come to His rescue. He
could have ripped His mask off and said, "Look you blind
sinners. I am the Son of God. Nobody does this to me and
gets by with it." And He could have wiped out the whole lot
of them. But Jesus refused to remove the mask. He died
looking like a common criminal. One Roman Centurion
got a peak under the mask and saw who He really was and
said, "Truly this was the Son of God." But it changed
nothing, for the rest saw only the mask and they crucified
Him.
To the end He wore His mask because of His love for all
mankind. If saving men meant so much to Jesus, there is
certainly something missing in our love for Jesus if we are not
motivated to share this good news of His love. Paul said he
would become all things to all men that he might win some.
Paul would wear any mask and be what he had to be to win
men. Are we willing to play different roles in life to touch
others for Christ? Jesus paid an awful price to wear His
mask for us. Are we willing to wear a mask for Him? We
need to learn how to relate well to anyone God brings into
our lives that we might in some way touch them for Christ.
This was a goal Jesus had in mind all along, and it will help
us cooperate in fulfilling the ultimate purpose of the
mysterious mask of the Master.
