Peter and I had some heavy conversation this week about Matthew 16:13-28.
When did the driver know that the pavement was angry? At the crossroads.
Have you
ever noticed that there is a mess in Messiah?
Do you think
that Jesus is building the Church on Peter (Greek petros, English
stone/rock) because he is a foundation stone or because he is so dense?
Or can you
see the blockbuster movie here? “Rocky,” the prequel!
How is it
that when things seem to be going so well, they can so quickly go horribly
wrong?
When Jesus
demands that his disciples take up their cross and follow, do you think it
means crucifixion or resurrection?
What are
angels anyway? What is glory?
What does
Jesus’ kingdom look like?
In a world
of expedited trials, food insecurity, banned books, and denial of history comes
this perplexing proposition of premature propitiation. Within it is a
presentiment of presumed punitive penalty and a paradisical pronouncement.
(Don’t you love the power of P?)
We know Matthew is leading us to the Mount of Transfiguration, but is that the kingdom Jesus refers to this week? (Oh, the places the mind goes.)
We know Matthew is leading us to the Mount of Transfiguration, but is that the kingdom Jesus refers to this week? (Oh, the places the mind goes.)
There are clearly more things to heaven and
earth than my poor little mouse brain can entertain, so I am going to simply
state my speculative surmises. (See what I did there using sibilant
alliteration? It is not the power of P, but it has its slithering space, I
think.)
Do you
remember the DoubleMint twins and the jingle of, “Double your pleasure, double
your fun, with double good, double good, DoubleMint gum. It is two, two mints in one”?
Entering this conversation with Scripture, I find it helpful to remember those words from Deuteronomy 30: “I have set before you, life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God.” (God is double-good; oh, but God is trinitarian. God must be triple-good, maybe like, Trident gum?)
Entering this conversation with Scripture, I find it helpful to remember those words from Deuteronomy 30: “I have set before you, life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God.” (God is double-good; oh, but God is trinitarian. God must be triple-good, maybe like, Trident gum?)
When Jesus
begins to show the disciples that he will undergo suffering and then be
crucified, we, with the disciples, hear it as a prophecy of what is to come. This
fits the narrative of Matthew’s Gospel, but the reality is Jesus was crucified
at least two generations before Matthew is writing. Moreover, I think Jesus is speaking
not so much as “both … and”, one and another, but as “both and …”. Both cross-bearing
(not an angry, steel ball) and self-denial (not the river in Egypt), Jesus’ commands,
present us with “both and …” thinking.
Over the
years people have thought (and I hear them often say), “Such-and-such is my
cross to bear.” When they suffer, they assume it is the cross Jesus has
commanded them to take up. This can lead them to what Peter tells me is the false
supposition that their suffering is like Jesus’ suffering and their cross to
bear is like Jesus’ cross of death.
But Jesus
suffers for us. Jesus dies for us. There is nothing particularly salvific in
our suffering, whether by mice or people. We do not die on the cross of Good
Friday in order to save anyone. The job of Savior is not ours. That job has
already been taken, and we rejoice in the fact that we do not have to, indeed
cannot, suffer and die for anyone.
It is not the
burdensome cross of death we are to take up because, in the words of Paul,
“Christ died once, for all.” Jesus wants us to take up the cross of
resurrection living. Without the resurrection on Easter Sunday, Good Friday,
after all, is meaningless. It is two, two crosses in one, and ….
Peter had me
pretty confused for a time, but I think I have finally caught on. There is also
a disturbing thread of theology that speaks of denying oneself as a kind of
erasure (like losing one’s tail). Peter says, in fact, self-denial results through
declaring to the world who and whose we are. This denial of self does not mean
that we somehow disappear.
Rather, self-interest
that knows who and whose we are allows Christ-centered, resurrection,
communitarian living. It is not our own sinful self that is important but our
self in Christ that makes the difference. In self-denial we live a life of awareness
(wokeness?) and personal development engaging all the issues of our world while
acknowledging and depending on Jesus’ leading and salvific promise. We are saint
and sinner, two in one, and ….
The
persistent search for building up “me” diminishes the importance of Christ, and
therefore I lose the very life I am seeking. When I lose my self-identity and
assume the identity of one living in Christ, I gain everything. This is the
paradox of faith. We live as valued individuals in Christian community, and yet
our wholeness cannot come from ourselves but only from Christ. (Who says one
can’t win by losing?)
While living
this life of self-denial, we are not erased but enhanced. We are raised up
through the waters of baptism into the resurrection kingdom world to work for
justice in word and deed, advocating for ourselves and our neighbors. All this
is done, not to be justified in Christ, but because by grace, in faith, through
Christ alone we are justified. In this relationship of kingdom justice, we
proclaim our identity in Christ and our place in the body of Christ. In taking
up the cross of resurrection living, we take up our cross of death and die to
death. If we die to death, we enter into resurrection.
I asked
Peter, “So how do we live out this paradox?” He told me that we express our
two, two identities in one, and… when we lift the hope-filled vision of a world
that acknowledges both Jesus as Messiah and the model he gives us for living a
Godly life. In this way, we join the role of messenger (Greek, angellos)
while Jesus comes with angels in his glory, bringing his kingdom now, and we
are repaid for all that we do and have done. This potential judgment of doom
hangs over us like the sword of Damocles (or the butcher knife of the farmer’s
wife), until we recognize that Jesus’ suffering and death is our justifying
sentence. We are judged in grace. Simultaneously, we claim God’s eschatological
kingdom of wholeness to come. This too is a two, two in one and ….
Through this
examination, we are given license to see ourselves mirrored in history while
proclaiming hope for the future—recognizing our proclivity for violent
demonstrations of baseless fearful reactions now liberated by the cross of
resurrection living to turn to peaceful resolution. Not always being able to
embrace the present and a hope-filled future, we sometimes react fearfully and exercise
authority by using pejorative power thus limiting the rights of others. The
violent acts of lynching and political mistrust in the present cannot bring
trust and reliance on the one who brings the kingdom of wholeness and peace.
Your pal, Nicodemus
Editor, Theologian,
Counsellor, Mouse
No comments:
Post a Comment