God’s grace, peace
and mercy be with you. … My focus is on Matthew 16:24 and Romans 12:10. Let us
pray. Heavenly Father, the psalmist wrote, “I rejoiced when they said to me, ‘Let us go
to the house of the Lord.’” Now that our feet are within your gates, we
rejoice to hear your Word. As we listen, may your Spirit enlighten our minds
and move our hearts to love deeply as Jesus loved. This we pray to you, Most
Holy Trinity. Amen.
There’s an old cartoon that depicts Jesus clarifying his
statement to a would-be disciple, “No, I
am not talking about Twitter. I literally want you to follow me.” Other
than the fact that Elon Musk changed the name to X. the cartoon illustrates a
lesson about language. Words change meaning overnight, over decades, centuries,
and millennia. So, let me begin by examining a few words from our texts – from Matthew,
follow, and from Paul, fraternal or brotherly affection. Then I will tell you
how two war-torn enemies became brothers, setting an example for us.
First, follow. The cartoon quote is funny because one can misconstrue
our Lord’s words as social media chatter. The word follow comes from the Old
English folġian or fylgan. I have said on several occasions
that follow has several meanings. It means to come after in a sequence, such as
B follows A in the alphabet. It means
to go after, pursue or move behind in the same path or direction. Follow that car! When you operate a new
power tool, follow the instructions. Fans follow an event, a team, or an
activity. As Jesus used the term, He wanted people to devote themselves to Him,
His Way and His teaching.
People quit their careers and families to follow Jesus. His
closest disciples sat at His feet. They travelled by boat and foot to hear Him
teach and witness Him heal. During His darkest moment, some followed at a
distance and stood at the Foot of the Cross. A group followed His Body to the
tomb and returned to anoint Him. After His Resurrection, the apostles followed
Him to Bethany and stared into the sky as He ascended.
Today’s passage, however, made it difficult for some to
follow Jesus any further. It was the first time Jesus predicted His passion. The
passage also marks the turning point into the final section of Matthew, who
wrote his Gospel for believers who knew the outcome of the story. Here, Matthew
illustrated the reaction people had to Jesus’ revolutionary and unexpected
teaching.
In its larger context, we see that Jesus’ original followers
were common, ordinary men and women, but they knew and understood God’s plan
for Israel and the world. They accepted Jesus’ teaching and witnessed the power
of God working through Him. They saw His teaching and work evoked faith from the
crowds and provoked persecution from religious and political authorities. With
these parties plotting His demise, Jesus and His disciples retreated to a
remote spot off the Sea of Galilee where He asked them who they believed Him to
be.
Hearing the answer, Jesus showed His enlightened disciples
what was required of Him – depart to Jerusalem to suffer many things from the
elders, chief priests and scribes, be killed and raised on the third day.
Is it no wonder why – in this peaceful spot – Peter and the
disciples reacted as they did? Why confront your enemies? Why provoke
politicians? Why suffer? Why go to Jerusalem to be killed? These normal human
questions arose from their sinful human minds. “If God’s mercy is to be found in Jerusalem’s Temple, then mercy and
not murder awaits you there. That is how God works, Jesus!” said Peter, the
man who declared Him the Messiah, the Son of the living God.
Peter was not simply confused, but took a firm stand against
the Lord. Peter articulated God’s activity in the world in a satanic way, expressing
the ‘things of men.’[1]
When reprimanded, the only thing Peter could do was get out of Jesus’ way and
not cause Him to stumble into disobedience that would have led to disaster for
Israel’s lost sheep and the world. Jesus was the person to first say, “Lead,
follow, or get out of the way.” By getting out of the way, Peter learned
what it meant to follow this
Christ, this Son of God.[2]
Because His disciples misunderstood how God works in the
world, verse 24 is the heart and summary of Jesus’ teaching. “If anyone would come after me, let
him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” … Only by yielding to His Father’s
will and His opponents, and accepting suffering and death by crucifixion could
people and creation be saved from sin and death. That is how God works
in the world.
The primary obstacle to following Jesus was not in the
world, but deep within the heart of every disciple. They had to reject the
tendency of insisting God conform to their ways and deal with evil according to
their expectations. They had to reject the tendency that if in charge, they
would make things right. They had to learn that criticism, competition or
quiet, prideful comparison disguised as sinful human ambition embraced and
exalted not the Cross of Christ, but them. “If
anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and
follow me.”
The first disciples who followed Jesus learned they could
not pre-determine the type of difficulty, suffering or martyrdom they would
face. As early Christians who worshipped the Trinity and renounced Greek and
Roman gods, their neighbors hated and rejected them. Ultimately, some Christians
found their way to crucifixion or some other gruesome form of death.
When it was time for him, Peter deemed himself unworthy to
die the same way as His Lord, and requested to be crucified upside-down. Others,
like James, died by the sword (Acts 2:12). Of course, not all Christians were
martyred. Christianity spread throughout the world, and to Rome, the setting
for my second point, “Love
one another with brotherly affection.”
Love one another with brotherly affection. Paul’s advice
begs the question, “What was Paul trying to accomplish in these final chapters
of Romans?” Paul was teaching Christians how to conduct their daily lives
through the power and structure of grace.
Romans reveals God’s relationship to rebellious creation; how
Christ reversed what Adam did; and how His death broke the power of sin. As human
beings freed from the domination of sin and the law, we are now dominated by
the Spirit. In chapter 9, Paul pointed towards the future and explained how
from the beginning God’s plan of gracious election was at work, culminating in
Christ who brought the law to an end by incorporating its goal in Him.
In chapter 12, Paul wrote about grace, which triumphed over
human rebellion. Grace does not mean that anything goes. Rather, there is a
structure to living the Christian life as individuals and communities. There is
a structure to denying yourself, picking up your cross and following Christ.
If the Christian community responds appropriately to the
structuring grace at work in it, it will display unity. Unity, however, is not
uniformity, as Paul emphasized the necessity of diversity based on the
abundance of God’s grace. Diversity is not based on race, ethnicity or gender
preferences. Nor is diversity simply a few people with special skills
contributing to the community. All church members have spiritual gifts, and are
responsible for discovering what gifts they have and use them to glorify God.[3]
In Rome, people confused ego with grace. Some saw their
gifts as more important than others’ gifts. That same problem arose in
communities throughout the next 21 centuries across the globe. The solution to
the problem of pride and over-inflated egos is simply love.[4]
Love
one another with brotherly affection.
That includes your enemies and those
who displease you. Why? Because while we were enemies with God, we were
reconciled to Him by the death of His Son (Rom 5:9-10). The point of heaping
burning coals on your enemy’s head is not to get back at him. Rather, you feed
and refresh those who displease you because it is how Christians effect
reconciliation with their enemies. A small gesture compared to how God effected
reconciliation with us, His rebellious enemies.
Paul’s advice was not to withdraw from the world into
seclusion as an individual or Christian enclave. Instead, Paul encouraged
Christians in 1st century Rome to live among others, but with a
different set of values. Attempting to reconcile and win over your enemies
through kindness, compassion and brotherly love was not an action people
embraced, but Christians did.
Christians of 1st century Rome believed Jesus
Christ died for their sins and rose from the dead. They believed that they,
once rebellious enemies of God, were reconciled through Christ’s death and
resurrection. When the Paschal Mystery is embedded in your heart, mind and
soul, you do what God asks or commands. You even deny yourself,
take up your cross and follow Christ by loving your enemies with brotherly
affection.
All well and good,
but what do the readings have to do with life today? How do we deny ourselves,
pick up our cross and follow Jesus? How do we love enemies with brotherly love?
Let me tell you a
story of two men, intent on killing one another in war, who became as close as
brothers. While serving as pastor in Oakmont, I met Gerri Hamilton. Gerri was a
faithful and loving member of our church. One day, she asked me to visit her
husband, Howard, who was in the hospital. That was the spring of 1998. By
December, he died from a long illness. Yet, Howard should have died in 1943. That
did not happen. God spared Howard. After World War Two, he and Gerri, had three
sons and a daughter. After a distinguished career in manufacturing, Howard became
a professor of electrical engineering at the University of Pittsburgh.
You see, during
World War II, on his 22nd mission as a bombardier in the Army Air
Corps, Howard’s B-17 was hit by enemy fire on October 10th. It punctured
his lung. He lost consciousness and regained it only to have his parachute pack
strap catch on the door handle. He dangled as the plane spiraled. He did not
have enough strength to free himself. His co-pilot risked his life to set him
free.
Howard landed in a
tree. The Germans captured him and took him to a hospital where he lay on a
stretcher for 12 hours until an officer in charge of prisoners of war begged
the one lone surgeon to treat him because he would die before morning.
In captivity for
19 months, initially in a hospital and then in Stalag Luft on the Baltic Sea, he was liberated by the Russians on
May 1, 1945. After the war, Howard went to college on the GI bill, began his
career and family.
Howard lived a successful
life professionally and personally, but that is not why I tell you the story of
what happened to a twenty-year old kid 80 years ago. You see, Howard and the
German officer who begged that he be treated did not forget each other. The
officer looked him up after reading a book about the raid. Howard and Gerri
visited him in Germany, and he visited them in Pittsburgh.[5]
If two men on opposite sides of history’s bloodiest war,
intent on killing one another, could reconcile and treat one another with
brotherly love, who of us cannot reconcile with people we dislike and love them,
as Christians should?
Friends, we may never fly as bombardiers, encounter our
enemy on a gurney, or spend years as a P.O.W., but we have relatives and
neighbors, co-workers and colleagues, and even church members who have wronged
us. Some owe you money because they rent space in your head thinking of what
they once did to you. And although sin keeps me from reconciling with God and
them, as a Christian, I bear the cross of reconciliation behind
Christ. Because of Jesus Christ and His grace, we can
reconcile with people we dislike because God reconciled with us when we were
enemies.
This week, treat one person you dislike or disliked with
love, and see what happens. When you do, may the peace of God
that surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
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