Jerusalem Bound
Matthew 16:21-28
21From 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.22And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, “God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.”23But 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.”
24Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.25For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.26For 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?27“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.28Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”[i]
Let’s place Jesus’ response to Peter and his disciples in the larger conversation the gospel writer of Matthew records just prior to this exchange. Matthew 16: 13, ‘Jesus asks his disciples, Who do people say that the Son of Man is? Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets. He said to them, But who do you say I am? Simon Peter answered, You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered him, Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.’
I love Peter! I love his enthusiasm, his boldness, his courage, his over the top responses to life and I love the insights to Christian living we are privileged to witness as we watch Jesus respond to Peter.
- So what will we learn today?
- Where will the Holy Spirit’s guidance lead us?
- What is the Good News for us in this place?
‘21From 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.
With the phrase ‘from that time on’ the gospel writer of Matthew signals a shift in the narrative. Earlier in Matthew 10:7, the gospel writer describes the sending out of the twelve, ‘As you go, proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near. Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.’
There is no mention of going to Jerusalem -which the early audience would know was code for “a place where bad things happen to prophets!” no mention of being persecuted by the religious leaders, and certainly no mention of being killed.[ii]
A little further on Matthew 11: 3, we have the disciples of John asking Jesus, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?’ Jesus answered them, ‘Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.’
Again- this is great news- positive things are happening- no mention of suffering, persecution or killing, not to mention that all this was to happen at the hands of those in religious authority.
In the notes John Wesley prepared for his itinerant preachers, he lends us an insight into the early listener’s view of the religious authorities, ‘The elders- the most honorable and experienced men; the chief priests-accounted the most religious; and the scribes- the most learned body of men in the nation. Would not one have expected, that these should have been the very first to receive him? [iii] This could have been Peter’s expectation, his hope for Jesus.
22And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, “God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.”
Peter took him aside- that’s what you do when you don’t want to embarrass the person in front of everyone else. You pull them aside, out of earshot of everyone else, so the person can save face. The phrase ‘rebuke’ however says that the gospel writer wants to emphasize Peter’s intensity with this conversation. This isn’t a ‘next time you might want to get the fruit instead of the fried mars bar’ type of discussion.
Peter is saying ‘wait a minute, time out! This is not part of the plan.
Who in the world is this good news for?!’
Perhaps we can understand Peter’s confusion.
23But 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.”
Before we pick Peter up off the ground from being blasted, hear what Jesus just said, ‘you are a stumbling block to me.’ While outside the time constraints of our discussion this morning, what an interesting view into Jesus’ understanding of self this comment can be! This isn’t someone who ‘has it all figured out,’ or doesn’t struggle with the choices in front of him. I hear the writer of this gospel describe Jesus as a person who recognizes the temptation to ‘set your mind on human things,’ instead of divine things. Jesus wants to be clear to himself and those who choose to follow him that his path, his obedience to God may not be what you expect of a Messiah.
I wonder if the intensity of Peter’s rebuke and the matching intensity of Jesus’ response to Peter catch the interest and attention of the rest of the disciples as Jesus now addresses the whole group.
24Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.
Let me first talk a bit about what I do not think this phrase means.
· You’re discussing last week’s budget meeting at church with a fellow parishioner. One of the other budget committee members constantly questions your proposals, your contributions, and your best ideas. Referring to this committee member you say to your friend, ‘I guess he/she is my cross to bear.’
Probably not what this phrase means.
· Your co-workers schedule regular happy hour events on Wednesday evening when you want to be in choir practice. Feeling sad about missing out on the camaraderie at work, you mention this to your choir section leader with the sigh, ‘probably just my cross to bear.’
Again, probably not what is meant.
· Your vote to end the choir director, youth director, and/or assistant or senior pastor’s (fill in your choice of ministry position) covenantal relationship with your church is a minority vote. Sharing your disappointment with your spouse you say, ‘I guess he/she is going to be my cross to bear.’
Definitely not what is meant!
4Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.
What might Jesus be talking about?
Let’s start with who we are following.
He said to them, But who do you say I am? Simon Peter answered, You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.’ And Jesus answered him, Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.’
When we start with this declaration of faith
Jesus, you are the Messiah, the Son of the living God
and let Jesus’ behavior-what Jesus does- flow out of being in relationship with God- who Jesus is-, we get Jesus’ choice to be obedient, obedient to the living God.
And this is precisely how Peter gets it wrong. Peter wants Jesus’ behavior, what he does, to flow out of who Peter understands the Messiah ought to be.
Peter is:
· Someone who is concerned with pushing the religious and political leaders too far (were you not part of his group? No- not me- and in the background you hear the rooster crowing)
· Someone who extends the purity laws about food (what is clean and what is unclean) to define who is clean or unclean before God. And in Acts 10-we have the story of Peter dreaming about a really big sheet filled with all sorts of creatures (clean and unclean) and God saying ‘hungry? Go ahead, eat.’
Peter, listen to the whole phrase, which God’s spirit brought to you,
‘Jesus, you are the Messiah, Son of the living God.’
We come to understand Jesus as Messiah in relationship to the living God; in loving, obedient relationship.
Perhaps we’re now ready to look at what ‘taking up your cross and following me’ could mean for us today.
I want to posit one suggestion and then this lesson is yours.
If we are going to look at who Jesus is by what Jesus does-what did Jesus do when he was on the cross? We turn to the gospel writer of Luke (Luke 23: 34), ‘Then Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.’
Is this what you do when you take up your cross? You forgive people? Or you ask for forgiveness?
Perhaps taking up your cross and following Jesus could mean:
· That who I become in relationship with God will shape how I behave.
· That the phrases ‘I’m sorry, please forgive me’ and ‘I forgive you’ shape and inform my conversations and relationships.
· Maybe we were reminded of just how much like Peter we are-
o the times when like Peter we allow for God’s spirit to be present to us and in us; and the times when we let the rest of the disciples move closer to Jesus as we take a deep breath, recover, and take comfort in God’s quiet presence.
· Maybe we heard a nuance of Jesus’ understanding of himself as one who could be tempted that we hadn’t heard before. And we respond to this learning with awe and wonder.
Where is the Holy Spirit guiding your listening, your discernment?
· Maybe the Holy Spirit is calling us to repent of our holding our view of who and what a Messiah could be so tightly as to resist Jesus’ rebuke to us.
What is the good news for us today in this place?
· The Good News for us today is the full gospel narrative-
o For God so loved the world that God gave God’s only Son that whoever believes in him may not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16)
o The Good News is that Jesus calls us to experience this eternal life now in relationships that speak of repentance, of acceptance, and of loving obedience to a living God.
24Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.
I do not know where you are in your faith journey today. Maybe you are experiencing the joy, the peace, the wonder of God revealing Godself to you, as God did to Peter. I celebrate and join you in praising and worshipping God.
Perhaps you stand with Peter, dusting yourself off from being blasted by Jesus, ‘Get behind me Satan,’ as you recognize you have restricted who and what Jesus does to fit your definition of Messiah-whatever that may be. If so, you are in good company- all of us, at some point in our faith journeys find ourselves with Peter.
It could be that you have not made that declaration of faith yet. While New York Mayor John Bloomberg may be an unlikely person to quote in a sermon, addressing a news conference yesterday regarding hurricane Irene Mayor Bloomberg said, ‘The time to leave is now!’ I’ll change that a bit, ‘the time to follow Jesus is now!’
Today, may we join in Peter’s proclamation with every part of our being- our heart, soul and might, and say with me please,
‘Jesus- you are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.’
And all of God’s people say, ‘AMEN.’
[i] The New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America.
[ii] Chris Haslam, ‘verse 21: For Jerusalem as the city where prophets are put to death by the religious authorities’ http://montreal.anglican.org/comments/apr221.shtml
