This past month I have preached one funeral sermon and listened to
homilies, eulogies, and one poem at three funerals. Although none of the folks who died were martyrs in the
sense of being killed because of their witness to the gospel, all three spent
their lives in ways that reflected their belief in the good news of God in
Jesus Christ. They made choices
about how to live their lives—about what their path would be, as we all do.
In our gospel reading today, we glimpse a picture of conflicting
paths. Peter rebukes Jesus for
suggesting a path of suffering and death and resurrection for the Son of man, a
Messianic title from a vision described in the 7th chapter of the
Old Testament book of Daniel. Peter has confessed earlier that he believed
Jesus was the Messiah of God, but he—and other disciples as well—appeared to
expect the Messiah to be a triumphant, victorious Savior. Had he been following Jesus expecting a
place in the triumphant reign of God?
Did he not understand resurrection as a triumphant over evil?
Jesus' rebuke of Peter and his words to the “crowd with the
disciples” seems harsh, but also prophetic. Let's look more closely at the
points Jesus made.
His first point: Peter was “not setting his mind on divine things,
but on human things.” Jesus is
setting up a either/or situation: Accept the way I'm describing how God will
work or you will be part of the problem, holding naturally human expectations
of self-interest and power.
His second point: My
followers will be persecuted, be tortured and die for their faith. Jesus pulls
no punches in telling how bad it will get for those who follow him. If his followers seek to avoid death,
life forever in God's presence will be lost to them. No matter how large and wonderful the prize one might gain,
if one avoids being killed for the gospel, it will not be worth it. Accept that what I will have to endure,
Jesus says, for you will have to endure it as well.
His final point: If you
choose the ways of human beings, you will be part of the sinful, adulterous
people who live full of self-interest and lust for evil. And there will be no hope of salvation
when the Messiah returns in the great glory of God and the angelic hosts. I, Jesus, will view you as losers.
All this sounds judgmental and punitive—can accepting the good news
of God ever be based on making a choice based on fear? And can one's choice be less than
risking death for the sake of the good news?
Let's remember at this point Jesus was speaking to the crowd: What
do possibly have to offer in return for your life? If you try to save your life from taking a difficult path
for the sake of the gospel, you will lose it.
If Jesus had passed a sign-up sheet for becoming his disciples at
that moment, how many folks in the multitude do you think would have signed
up? Remember on the night Jesus
was arrested and his disciples faced the frightening possible of arrest and
crucifixion as conspirators in rebellion against Roman authority, they just
disappeared and hid in a locked room.
Yet if we look at the arc of Jesus' teaching and ministry, we find a
great deal of compassion for those who are suffering. He defended the woman taken in adultery. He touched and healed lepers and a man
born blind. He blessed children. He sparred verbally with a foreign woman, was
bested by her in their argument and then he agreed to heal her daughter. He
taught us to love our enemies. He even forgave the disciples who had deserted
him and renewed their calling to be his disciples. And in response the disciples did take up their crosses and
follow him, even to their deaths.
To become martyrs for the gospel was not an attractive idea when
Jesus called on his disciples to choose this path. Most, if not all, of us, view taking up our cross as a
metaphor for dealing with some extremely difficult situation or person. We never expect to be asked to put our
lives on the line for the sake of the gospel. Rather we take up our
metaphorical crosses in an effort to offer Jesus' compassion to others through
what we do or say.
So our witness to the good news of Jesus [for martyr is from a Greek
word for to witness] may not be to choose a path that might well lead to our
death, but to choose a path that involves giving up something society values in
order to choose what God values.
In his book How the Irish Saved Civilization Thomas Cahill tells how martyrdom came to be
redefined when being killed for publicly expressing one’s faith. So-called “red martyrdom” was not an
issue in Ireland until the Reformation.
Therefore, ascetic practices—often by monks or nuns—such as fasting,
living alone as a holy hermit, penitent physical labor, and other types of
self-denial, served as public expressions of one's faith in Christ and came to
be called “green martyrdom.”
Green martyrdom was understood to fulfill Jesus' command to deny
yourself, to take up your cross and to follow him, when becoming a “red martyr”
was not likely. If red martyrdom
drew you closer to God, green martyrdom should as well.
Thus, when we “give up” something for Lent, could we consider
ourselves as practicing green martyrdom? How does that work for you? Does whatever you have chosen for your
Lenten discipline appear to bring you closer to
God? What seems to get in your
way? Whatever gets in your way,
speak forcefully to it saying, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your
mind not on divine things but on human things.” Then you can allow your life to be lost in God's love!
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