15 September 16th After Trinity
Readings: Isaiah 50.4-9a; James 3.1-12; Mark 8. 27-38.
Theme: Profit and Loss
The cost of discipleship is our theme for today. The realization, declared by Peter, that Jesus is the Messiah comes at a cost for those who are to follow this anointed one. As Jesus explains, the Son of Man must suffer and eventually die but will rise again on the third day. The implication of this is that for those who follow the messiah, the journey will be no less difficult. It will require self-denial to follow the Lord because the desire for safety and security must be traded in for the life of following the Lord wherever he calls us to go. This means relinquishing control of our lives so that the life we live will be the one which is given to us to live by the Lord. In other words, we will live our lives as a vocation and not as some kind of self-expression with artistic license. This is why we are to become followers and not leaders. It is the Lord who leads and so the self must be denied in order that the head of our body may lead us.
Peter is half aware of what he is saying in his statement of recognition that Jesus is the messiah. He clearly has some insight into who this person is, but it is not really the insight he will require to be a true follower of Jesus because he thinks he knows how the story line should go. For Peter, Jesus is the messiah, but the one who will liberate Israel in a way which he imagines that this should happen. Whether this was to overthrow the Roman authorities or to create a panacea on earth, the real problem with Peter at this point in the gospel story is that he is not truly following the Lord. He wants to control the narrative. And, who can blame him. Most of us probably want to do the same because the risk involved in letting go is great. Yet, the loss of control is the profit of the kingdom. It is to live a life given by God and to orient ourselves to the long term goal rather than the short term goal of the survival of our own narrative of life.
This is obviously easier said than done and for Peter he is really not there yet. In fact, Jesus uses some very harsh words in addressing Peter even calling him “Satan” because he is “setting (his) mind not on divine things but on human things.” However, as our first reading from Isaiah reminds us, if we are to be followers of the Lord there is a cost, it will involve a certain degree of rejection of the world as we choose to open our ears “to listen as those who are taught”.
I say a ‘certain degree of rejection’ here because this very same Lord who bids us to turn away from the world also calls us to engage in the world, but not on its terms. In other words, the world with which we are to engage is the Lord’s and it is good. But it does not recognize this in its deafness to hear the call of the Lord. So, the profit of our discipleship of the Lord is the gain of a life which is truly crafted by the Lord and the loss is of an image of life and of ourselves that we make according to our own fantasies.
This turning point of the true realization of the profit and loss of the disciple is the moment Peter is passing through in our gospel. He is passing through the moment of confrontation between his image of Jesus as the messiah, and no doubt his part in this venture, and the reality of who Jesus really is. The messiah will indeed bring an end to a certain false image of the self which inhabits the world, but it will not be as Peter imagines. It will be through the self-emptying of one’s life in service, symbolized in our gospel by the cross, that one will truly inherit eternal life. In other words, if we truly want to live, if we really desire to be firing on all cylinders, we need to listen and to follow.
Yet, how little we often learn in life of how to tune in to the Lord in our daily desire for survival. The relinquishing of one’s control of life is not one which comes naturally to most people. It requires a training that schools us in receptivity. This receptivity is the life of prayer which attunes us to the voice of the Lord and permits us to hear his voice. Peter was not on this wavelength despite his insight in this gospel. He was still on the frequency of “Radio Peter” blasting out the tunes he was playing in his head. The channel of the Lord we are called to listen to, “Radio Jesus”, you might say, has a distinctive sound to it, which over time we learn to perceive. It teaches us what life is truly about and narrates a life story, which has dimensions must larger than we are ordinarily accustomed to because it transcends death and take us into the infinitely spacious realm of eternal life. This realm is the realm of the kingdom which is both now here on earth and always yet to come in the continuing arrival of heaven in time and space.
The metaphorical slap in the face that Jesus gives Peter in the gospel is his wake up call to this eternal life; a life which we detect each time we listen to “Radio Jesus”. Yes, this does involve a loss. It involves a certain loss of a way of being in the world which listens to its own radio station, “Radio Me”. As consoling as this channel may seemingly be, once we hear the sound of “Radio Jesus”, we instantly know that that there is a channel of far superior quality. May this music play on in our lives and bring us to dance to the rhythm of eternal life.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.