You couldn’t exactly call today’s scriptures
light summer reading. They come closer to Hamlet than to
Much Ado About Nothing! The Church doesn’t seem to care that it’s
still summer and we’re trying to savor the last days of vacation. But
there is no vacation from the gospel; no vacation from following Jesus.
Jeremiah sets the tone today. His words border
on blasphemy. He pulls no punches when he tells God, “You duped me,
Lord, and I let myself be duped.” No tip-toeing around there! And who
can blame Jeremiah? God had given him a message to deliver, a message no
one wanted to hear, a message that turned everyone against him - made
his life one long tale of woe, of opposition, arrest, imprisonment, and
public disgrace. No wonder Jeremiah felt “duped,” no wonder he cried
out, ‘enough! I’ve had it with speaking in your name, Lord!’
But Jeremiah went on speaking in spite of
himself. God’s word was a fire burning within him and, try as he might,
he couldn’t contain the fire. Talk about a no-win situation. If he
didn’t speak God’s word it consumed him from within like a fire, and if
he did - and when he did - it only got him into trouble.
We should be able to identify with Jeremiah. If
we take our faith at all seriously, if we honestly try to live our faith
beyond just paying it lip service – and we do - then sooner or later
we’re going to feel that we’ve been duped because God will take us to
places we really don’t want to go; God will ask us to give what we don’t
want to give. For the truth, my friends, is that, for a follower of
Jesus it’s not all that different from what it was for Jeremiah. It’s
true he received his call to be prophet while still in his mother’s
womb, but for most of us, ours came early, too – beginning at our
baptism - and we can escape our call no more than he could. There’s no
easy way out. But we tend to look for ways.
So did Peter, as was evident in today’s gospel.
When Jesus began to speak openly about the suffering and death that
awaited him in Jerusalem, Peter wouldn’t hear of it. “Far be it from
you, Lord. God forbid that you should suffer!” And Peter’s effort to
stake out an easy way earned him a stinging rebuke from Jesus: “Get
behind me, Satan. You are thinking not as God does but as human beings
do!”
Those few words of Jesus are the heart of
today’s message. God’s way of thinking and our way of thinking are not
the same. Not even remotely. God’s ways turn our ways upside-down and
inside-out. With God, losing becomes saving, giving up becomes gaining,
dying becomes living. “Whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but
whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what profit would
there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life in the
process?”
You’re probably at least somewhat familiar with
the so-called “Prosperity Gospel” - the belief among some Christians -
hugely popularized by televangelists – that God blesses faithful
believers with prosperity, with wealth - financial success, and that
generous donations to the church – the more the better – will not only
win God’s favor, but also increase one’s material wealth. With this line
of thinking, faith becomes a transactional thing – an entitlement -
little more than a deal or a contract we enter into with God. In return
for placing our faith in God – and placing generous gifts in the
collection basket! - God rewards us with security, wealth, and
affluence. Simple as that.
Way too simple. Right? In fact, the
Prosperity Gospel is no gospel at all. It makes a mockery of the
Christian gospel. When we signed up to be Christians we received no
‘signing bonus’, no stock options, no assurance of prosperity, and
certainly no entitlement to a suffering-free or a sacrifice-free life.
Just the opposite, in fact. In the words of St. Paul in today’s passage
from Romans, when we signed on with Jesus Christ we agreed to “offer our
bodies – our very selves – as a living sacrifice to God.” And
sacrifice is a costly thing, and a counter-cultural thing. It was for
Jeremiah, it was for Jesus, and it was for Peter, too – as he would one
day find out.
My friends, our culture – so fixated on
individualism, self-indulgence, conspicuous consumption, and avoidance
of pain at any cost - places little or no value on sacrifice. And yet
sacrifice, rooted in love, is at the heart of the Christian life. And
sacrifice, rooted in love, is at the heart of our worship, too.
Sacrifice is what we do every time we gather to celebrate the Eucharist,
for this is precisely the place where the sacrifice of Jesus on the
cross intersects with our lives: where his sacrifice becomes our
sacrifice. “Do this in memory of me” is far more than an invitation to
repeat a ritual: it is an invitation to a way of life!
So, my friends, St. Paul’s words in today’s
second reading: “Do not conform yourselves to this age,” are meant to be
taken to heart. And so are those challenging words that Jesus spoke to
Peter: “You are thinking not as God does but as human beings do!”
Father Michael G. Ryan
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