Romans 12.9-21; Matthew 16.21-28
When Jesus outlines his God-given mission—suffering, rejection, crucifixion, death—he stretches human expectations to the breaking point. Right before today’s gospel reading begins, Peter had declared that Jesus was Son of God and Messiah, God’s anointed one spoken about by the psalms and prophets; the leader who would come at the end of the ages to set the world right—the ultimate triumph for God.
Peter was correct, of course. But today, Peter’s way of thinking collides with the necessity of Jesus’ God-given mission. “Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering…and be killed, and on the third day be raised.”
Dying to secure victory? No one wins by losing. Peter knows that. You know that. The Bison football team knows that; they know they won’t secure a bowl bid in their new division by losing all their regular season games. That’s why Peter’s response about Jesus’ own coming God-ordained suffering and death is basically, ‘That is the last thing God would want for you.’ Only to Jesus, that way of thinking is devilish. ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are in my way.’ Peter’s way of thinking needs to be reshaped by God’s way of thinking; his life reshaped by Jesus’ life.
The trouble for us is that the text doesn’t end with Peter and Jesus arguing game strategy. It’s one thing for the two of them to have a theological disagreement. It’s quite another for Jesus to draw us into this same life, to say that we need to share the same strategy and God-given mission. “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”
When Jesus calls us to take up the cross, he is not talking about patiently putting up with a generic burden or annoyance. ‘My neighbor’s garbage bin is too close to my house. The smell! Guess it’s a cross I must bear.’ That’s not what Jesus means.
Nor do I believe that when Jesus talks about taking up the cross, he means things like sickness, for example. Cancer and chronic illness are part of the fallenness of creation, a side-effect of our mortality.
When facing challenges, the most important thing to remember is that Jesus is faithful to us through them, meets us in them, and that during them we can bear witness to his life and grace. And that is what it means to take up the cross: not to passively put up with what comes our way but to take up the active life of the gospel, to have our way of thinking shaped by God’s way of thinking, our life shaped by Jesus’ own self-giving life and love on the cross and bear witness to him as we follow.
In today’s second reading, St Paul offers practical examples of the active life of the cross and the gospel at work in, and through, us. “Love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor…Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers. Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them…If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.”
Paul offers a profound sense of mission for every congregation and a guiding sense of purpose for each believer—a way of life shaped by Jesus. If you’ve ever wondered what God’s purpose is for your life, read Romans chapter 12 in its entirety. Then re-read it with a notebook at hand, writing down specific ways that you can practice the life laid out for us there. Then go through the chapter a third time, notebook at hand, to identify where you have fallen short and need both forgiveness and the Spirit’s guidance. Romans 12 is a clear and practical guide for taking up the cross and bearing witness to the beauty, goodness, and truth of Jesus to family, with neighbors, and in the world you inhabit; your way of thinking shaped by God’s way of thinking, a distinctive way of life shaped by Jesus’ life.
Now there will, for us, be challenges in this life, times when our hearts and minds are, like Peter in the gospel, stretched beyond our capacity. For example, today’s reading from Romans ends with Paul saying, “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” Can you imagine?
This week I was struck by the many stories honoring Dolly Parton that highlighted the way she managed the difficult task of speaking about issues that mattered to her while staying away from partisan politics. “Everybody knows I don’t do politics.” This doesn’t mean she lacked conviction. She simply believed her role was to unite and encourage people. Maybe that, uniting and encouraging, is the greatest conviction of all. And since Parton’s ability to do this was a quality praised by both Fox News and CNN, I’d say she managed to do it. “I’m just happy that anything I do can help somebody else.”
As for the rest of us? “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” Polarization, misinformation, and fear are all symptoms of our broken and sinful human nature. What can we do in the face of such challenges? How can we have hope and live as people of hope in a world that makes anxiety and fear its specialty?
One temptation is to surrender to it, throw up our hands in exasperation, turn off the lights, pull down the curtains, and wait for it to pass. It’s tempting to turn away from a difficult world with its difficult demands; maybe things will have sorted themselves out by the time we turn back. But that won’t do. The purpose of the of Jesus’ followers is not to crouch defensively against the world but to be a light to the nations, salt of the earth, a mirror reflecting the values and goals of the kingdom of God.
Another temptation, an especially dangerous one, is to fight fire with fire, to try and overcome evil with self-righteous indignation, to use words as weapons or worse. The temptation to hate, to despise, to revile people that we view as ignorant or stupid or selfish or cruel is real. It makes us feel like we’re the winners. But that won’t do, either. “No, ‘if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink.’”
Your enemies! It’s an echo of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. “You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.” But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” An early Church Father named Origen said, “If you think someone is evil and therefore decide to withhold your love, just remember that Christ died for the unjust. If you think your neighbor is a sinner and thus ought not be loved, then recall that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.”
“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.”
Now this cross-shaped life need not come in heroic deeds, though it very well could. “No one has greater love than this,” Jesus says, “than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” The active life of the gospel is also seen in small deeds done daily: rejoicing with those who rejoice, says Paul (in other words, not feeling envy over someone else’s good fortune); weeping with those who weep (not taking pleasure from someone else’s misfortune); living in harmony with one another (confessing the sin within us that condescends, wounds, divides, dismisses).
To take up the cross is to bear witness to the beauty, goodness, and truth of Jesus at all times and places. It means choosing kindness when resentment would be easier; forgiving someone who has genuinely hurt us; speaking up for someone treated unjustly; showing generosity when selfishness is tempting; listening patiently instead of trying to win an argument; telling the truth when a lie would protect us; or sacrificing time and convenience to care for another person. It means putting the needs of others alongside, and sometimes ahead of, our own interests.
In this way of life there will be challenges, loss; we will be stretched. Yet this is “life that truly is life,” to borrow a phrase from elsewhere in the New Testament. This is life that truly is life—our way of thinking guided by God’s way of thinking, our life shaped by Jesus’ own self-giving life and love on the cross.
And it is Jesus’ gift for you.
Around the year 400, St Augustine heard what Jesus said about finding life by letting go, about taking up the cross and following, our life and thinking stretched to the limits. “How hard and painful does this appear! The Lord has required that any who want to follow must come after him and deny themselves.” How hard and painful. But through prayer and reflection on Jesus’ life, Augustine saw more than challenge in Jesus’ word; he found hope in the gift of Jesus himself. “What the Lord commands is neither hard nor painful when he himself helps us. For whatever seems hard in what is commanded, love makes easy.”
That love comes to us in Jesus. That love is Jesus. “By this we know love,” says the letter of 1st John, “that Christ laid down his life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for one another.”
As we take up the cross and follow, we are not left to ourselves. As we take up the cross and follow in the active life of the gospel, the gift of Jesus’ self-giving life on the cross is the source of our own: our way of thinking reshaped by God’s thinking and our lives reshaped by Jesus’ life; our witness reflecting the distinctive beauty, goodness, and truth of Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God.
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