Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Francis Beckham
The Second Sunday in Lent B, February 25, 2024
Click here for an audio of the sermon
If I were to ask by a show of hands how many of us want to be like Jesus, I’m sure I’d see as many arms raised as there are people in this chapel. Similarly, if I were to ask, “Who’s ready to proclaim the Good News? Feed the poor? Comfort the afflicted? Visit prisoners and captives?” there isn’t a doubt in my mind I’d be knocked to the floor by shouts of, “Ooh! Ooh! Me! I do!”
I’m sure we’d all say yes, and I’m sure we’d all really mean it. I can’t help, though, wondering if we’d respond quite so enthusiastically to Jesus’ invitation to proclaim the Reign of God if we really understood what we were signing up for. Certainly, we, like Peter, think that we do understand: Go, sell all we have and give it to the poor. Try not to place stumbling blocks before the Children of God. Turn the other cheek. Show mercy. And so forth.
Indeed, these are all things that we must do if we want to follow Jesus. But as the disciples – and, particularly, Peter – learn in today’s Gospel reading, there’s important work to be done even before we can begin performing the spiritual and corporal acts of mercy. And there’s a pretty high cost to discipleship, too. In fact, being a disciple requires a lot more than even dispossessing ourselves of all our earthly goods; it involves dispossession of our everything. Even for Jesus, spreading the Good News will eventually mean having to lay down his own life. In Mark’s gospel, this is the first time Jesus shares this piece of information with the disciples. And Peter, at least, is not thrilled about hearing it.
Nevertheless, danger and sacrifice are fundamental realities of the ministry of Jesus. As we know, he will suffer and die for it. So, before they can go any further, Jesus has to make sure Peter and the others understand that staying the course means they must be willing to make those very same sacrifices. Jesus must be completely clear on this point.
That’s because Jesus knows that, despite possessing intelligence and generally good intentions, we humans just don’t always get it. We’re understandably conditioned to react to danger like Peter does: sensibly. After all, Jesus – who had already been making trouble for the religious establishment – is announcing in front of members of the Sanhedrin, the council which exercised religious authority over the Jews, that he needs to be killed. To Peter, and probably to any of us, that would sound like inviting trouble – asking for it, basically. Frankly, it would have seemed less reasonable if Peter, as Jesus’ friend, hadn’t pulled him aside and told him to knock it off.
But instead of coming to his senses and saying to Peter, “Oh man, you’re right. I guess I got a little carried away back there. Hey, thanks for looking out for me, buddy,” Jesus turns around, looks at everyone else, and basically tells him to can it, while seemingly calling him Satan. Not exactly a tender moment between friends.
Why does Jesus react so strongly to Peter’s genuine expression of concern? When I react that way during those kinds of conversations, it’s because my ego doesn’t like having its fragility exposed and challenged. But with Jesus, it’s different. He knows that Peter and the others must adopt a new mindset, or else risk failure. In our reading from the Lectionary, Jesus tells them, “You are setting your minds not on divine things but on human things.” The New American Bible translation, however, treats it slightly differently. There, Jesus says, “You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.”
I prefer that translation. To me, Jesus is telling his friends there’s another way to approach, value, and experience life, relationships, and God, and he’s inviting them to enter into that Way. This Way – which is the very Way of Jesus himself – involves fearlessly proclaiming the Love of God to all who hunger for it, by healing the wounds of injustice, banishing the burdens of shame and guilt, offering acceptance to those who have been excluded, and doing it all unconditionally, without regard to what human systems and institutions think, say, or do about it.
But to accomplish these things in the midst of an Imperial culture that values power over people – to fully realize God’s dream, as Presiding Bishop Curry so beautifully describes the mission and hope of Jesus – the disciples would first need to embrace a conversion of mind and attitude, accepting that the values and priorities of their inculturation must be un-learned and given up, even though it surely won’t be easy. “Whoever wishes to come after me,” Jesus cautions, “must deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow me.”
What was true for Peter and the other disciples is no less true for us here, today. In our annual Lenten observance, we are invited to enter into the same conversion of heart and mind, casting aside those things that do not help us in living out and proclaiming the Love of God to those who most need it – including to ourselves.
Exactly how each of us chooses to embrace this opportunity depends largely on the current realities of our lives; Lenten practices don’t look the same for everyone, and we shouldn’t feel inadequate if our penance seems less heroic than someone else’s.
Mostly, though, it really is a matter of examining and adjusting our mindset. Here at the monastery, we are reminded and encouraged in this in several ways.
For example, toward the end of Vespers of most Thursdays during the year, the Magnificat, or Song or Canticle of Mary from Luke’s gospel, is opened and closed with the antiphon “O LORD, you have lifted up the lowly, and filled the hungry with good things,” a line adapted from within the Magnificat itself, giving praise for God’s care of the poor, oppressed, overlooked, and marginalized.
But during Lent, Thursday’s Magnificat antiphon strikes a markedly different tone: “Use the present opportunity to the full,” it warns us, “for these are evil days; try to understand what the will of the LORD is.”
And throughout the year, we hear in our House Chapter readings of the Rule of Saint Benedict, “Run while you have the light of life, that the darkness of death may not overtake you.”
These are urgent exhortations, designed to spur us into action, because there is such great need to proclaim the Reign of God in our world. But we can only do so by first making space for God’s dream in our own lives. And that’s the assurance Jesus is offering to Peter, the others, and to us: By changing from thinking as humans do, to thinking instead as God does, we will be able to face any peril, any challenge, even when – not if – the culture around us pushes back.
The ministry of Jesus remains as dangerous a business as ever. But we must never forget that, while it’s true “Whoever wishes to save their life will lose it,” Jesus nevertheless promises “Whoever loses their life for my sake and that of the gospel will save it.”
So, here's to life in abundance, lived and freely shared with all, in the fullness of joy in Jesus, during this holy season of Lent, and always. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment