To Follow Means a Cross 9-3-23
To Follow Means a Cross
Jer 15:15-21; Mt 16:21-28
Jer 15:15-21
O Lord, you know; remember me and visit me, and bring down retribution for me on my persecutors. In your forbearance do not take me away; know that on your account I suffer insult. Your words were found, and I ate them, and your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart; for I am called by your name, O Lord, God of hosts. I did not sit in the company of merrymakers, nor did I rejoice; under the weight of your hand I sat alone, for you had filled me with indignation. Why is my pain unceasing, my wound incurable, refusing to be healed? Truly, you are to me like a deceitful brook, like waters that fail. Therefore thus says the Lord: If you turn back, I will take you back, and you shall stand before me. If you utter what is precious, and not what is worthless, you shall serve as my mouth. It is they who will turn to you, not you who will turn to them. And I will make you to this people a fortified wall of bronze; they will fight against you, but they shall not prevail over you, for I am with you to save you and deliver you, says the Lord. I will deliver you out of the hand of the wicked, and redeem you from the grasp of the ruthless.
Mt 16:21-28
From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, “God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.” But he turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life? “For the Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay everyone for what has been done. Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”
Prayer – Still-speaking Lord, as we gather this day we hear your call to take up our cross and follow. I want to say you don’t understand how hard that is, but then reality is that you actually do know how hard that is. Give us all that we need to be faithful followers – courage, conviction, fortitude; and perhaps most important that grace to be your follower, even when it means a cross – amen.
“If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me” says Jesus. And, based on much of that quote, Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes The Cost of Discipleship and generations of Christians learned new and productive lessons about religious practice that knows the difference between cultural Christianity and actual faithfulness. Bonhoeffer’s contribution to Christian self-understanding and to what it costs to be a follow was and is immense.
I have preached sermons entitled, The Cost of Discipleship, and have heard sermons about cross-bearing – they have been predominately religious, and conventional. And I suspect they are conventionally religious in ways that Bonhoeffer would find puzzling. Christians, desiring a more energetic and authentic faith have counted suffering in the name of carrying the cross. Theologians across the spectrum, desiring to respond to Jesus, have crafted theologies that focus on how the death of all things human – strength, righteousness, hope, intelligence – must precede our receiving new life from God. Some even have gladly proclaimed that God kills us in order to raise us. The problem with all of these reactions is not simply that they are masochistic – the problem is that they are religious – and conventional – and they made of Jesus’ word a metaphor.
In first century Palestine, people were actually crucified, and all of Jesus’ hearers knew that. Jesus’ words are not advocating religious athleticism. His words establish a connection with a world that suffers, a world that has a pretty good notion what torture and suffering looks and may feel like.
Jesus’ words foster honest awareness that there is no path through life except one that involves loss and perhaps suffering. Crucifixion was a disturbingly common fact of life during Jesus’ life. And the truth of the matter is that there has been no generation without war, no generation without disease or famine. Imagining a privileged freedom from suffering and sacrifice is a pointless fantasy. I wonder if Jesus’ words for us today call out both our privilege and fantasy, and reveal for us for what they are – escapist and irresponsible.
I suppose there might be a day, someday, when we humans construct a world in which people aren’t marginalized, tortured, scandalized for one reason or another. I suppose that we could construct such a world. But we have scarcely begun work on such a project, and there are world and community and church leaders who have learned that it is politically expedient to feed revenge fantasies by calling for people to attack, demean, belittle, ostracize – torture people they want to forget about. Jesus’ offensive, shocking words about carrying a cross does not allow us to imagine a world that is easy or simple, or better than this one. We are not allowed to forget the parts we would prefer to ignore as anomalies. Demeaning people, ridiculing the suffering, rewriting or ignoring the history of slavery and its present day aftermath, all these things are part of our regular world today. Can’t we just get past that some wonder? No, actually, if we are truly going to bear our crosses and follow, we cannot – not even maybe.
So how do we re-translate, re-hear Jesus’ words today. What is so obscene to us today that we feel the acid in our stomachs in the back of our throats? No one can be a follower unless you are beaten on the street. No one can follow me unless you are shot while carrying a bag of Peanut M&M’s. To believe that the Messiah is turning the world right-side-up, you have to be charged with resisting arrest without actually resisting. The list can go on – if you aren’t offended by items on this list then I haven’t done my job as an interpreter of the words of Jesus, because crucifixion in 1st century Palestine was an absolute obscenity and everyone knew it.
No wonder Peter shockingly exclaimed, “This must never happen to you,” and his words may make more sense now. To which Jesus responded, “Get behind me Satan,” his words now revealing that our dream of comfort and easy equity is a dangerous temptation to which we gladly give into when asked to be a follower. No wonder so many Christians today choose to believe in Jesus, rather than deny themselves, bear a cross and follow.
Our passage this morning confronts us with the gap between Jesus’ gruesome fate and our modest discipleship. Jesus’ verbs say it all. Deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me. WE all have crosses to bear, some are heavier than others. I spent a good half hour Friday after Patricia’s aunts memorial service counseling a great friend and good Christian brother on his struggle with his getting older and things not working as well as they used to – right now his cross is overbearing in his life. I talked at length with him about how one’s body doesn’t function as well as when it was younger and it is flat out tearing him up. Earlier in his life he struggles with alcohol and has successfully used the 12 step model to get a handle on his life. It took using the language of surrender, denying himself and surrendering to God before it began to sink in. As human’s we are not wired to surrender, to deny ourselves, and so what an incredibly difficult step it is to do so, and pick up one’s cross and then follow a path of self-denial, surrendering all the way to the cross.
In our passage this morning we are hearing Matthew’s distinctive voice, ‘salvation comes not to those who call Jesus, Lord, but to those who do what he says.’ The great commission that concludes Matthew’s gospel involves teaching people ‘to obey everything that I have commanded you.’ Jesus is saying to them and to us today, it is a matter of life and death. Disciples are to walk Jesus’ grim path.
So this morning we are confronted between Jesus’ call to discipleship and our own lives as part-time volunteers for the gospel. Few Christians abandon everything for the gospel’s sake. Most of us, me included, simply fit our Christianity into the open spots on our calendars. But this morning, Jesus is confronting us, calling us to realize that being a follower means there is a cross at the end of the road as well as all along the journey.
Not only does Jesus reinterpret what being a Messiah means – being a suffering servant; he also reinterprets what following that Messiah entails for the disciples. If Peter cannot bear the revelation of Jesus’ coming suffering, how will he respond when the focus shifts to followers whose fate mimics that of Jesus?
Honestly, there isn’t a lot of good feelings about our passage this morning. Moment by moment, many of us are constantly aware that we fall short of Jesus’ standard. And still our culture, our church world today doesn’t like pointing out that being a follower means bearing a cross. Most folks today who attend the mega-churches want to walk away feeling good about themselves; they believe 100% that God wants them to be prosperous and happy. This happiness assumption preached from far too many pulpits has sunk so deep into our collective psyche that even the words of Jesus can hardly challenge it. It may make one wonder if we are even capable of hearing that God might call us to radical sacrifice, or even danger posed by the cross? Can Jesus’ words this morning get past our ears?
I wonder how hard it is to hear Jesus’ words while we sit in well-cushioned, air-conditioned sanctuaries. Preachers who constantly preach deny yourself, pick up your cross and follow frequently find themselves out of a job. Precious few of us preachers lay everything on the line for the gospel, but we sure would like to ignore its call.
In 1961, a group of Nashville students resolved to reinforce the Freedom Rides. Two previous busloads of Freedom Riders had already encountered firebombing and severe beatings, and these Nashville students determined that the movement, having begun, should not be allowed to fail. No one could deny that these students experienced joy during their trials and travels. The notorious sheriff Bull Connor complained, “I just couldn’t stand their singing.” But those students were mindful for the potential cost of denying themselves as well. The night before they left Nashville, each and every one of those students signed their ‘last will and testaments.’ Singing hymns after signing one’s will – the cost and joy of being a follower of Jesus.
Perhaps our passage from Matthew this morning has helped me, and you, catch a glimpse of what life calling oneself a Christian really means – and makes us hesitate. Perhaps this is the moment when we are told that the life we thought we wanted, planned for, prayed for, was not the life God has in mind for us. Perhaps this is the moment when we might have to choose whether or not we are willing to have something else, or someone else, have more control over our lives than we do.
I wonder if our reflection on the meaning of the cross not as symbol of our Christian identity but as a reminder of this moment in time when we recognize and realize that our identity as Christians has been called into question by Jesus no less and we find ourselves at a crossroads. I wonder if our reflection this morning helps us to realize just how much is at stake, and how much may in fact be in jeopardy. I wonder if we have really begun to realize that to follow means all the way to the cross – God’s world is depending on it – amen.