Exodus 3:1-15, Romans 12:9-21, Matthew 16:21-28
Our Gospel reading today is extremely difficult, at least for me, and I have wrestled hard with it, especially with verses 24 to 26. What on earth does Jesus mean when he says that if we want to come after him, we will have to deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow him? And what does he mean when he says that whoever wants to save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for him (for Jesus) will find it? It might be helpful to follow along in your Bible as we explore these things.
First of all, the Greek word which is translated “life” in verse 25 is psyche, the word from which we get our English word “psychology”, meaning the study of the human soul, or personality. The word psyche in Greek can mean either the centre of the human self, that is the heart or the soul, or it can mean human life. In verse 25, psyche is translated “life”. In verse 26, however, the same word, psyche, is translated “soul”, in the NIV. “What good will it do a person if he gains the whole world yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a person give in exchange for his soul?”
Now, in order to get a grasp on this passage, let’s go back to the very beginning of things in the Genesis account of creation, where God forms the human (the Hebrew word for human is Adam), and breathes into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man becomes a living being (Genesis 2:7). It is a wonderfully intimate thing that happens here. God breathes his own life into the human being that he has formed. That life is not psyche, which is ordinary human life; it is Zoe, the Life of God himself. And it was God’s intention that we should ultimately be as gods. But we, human beings, were tempted to be gods in our own right; to be independent of God. We were tempted to believe that somehow God was holding out on us. We were tempted with a shortcut. And so we pulled free from God, our source of real life, even though we had been warned that to do so would mean death. Thus we get the tragic story of Genesis 3 and 4. After their pulling away from God, Adam and Eve hide from God because they are afraid. The intimate relationship between God and humankind has been broken. Human beings are no longer animated by zoe¸ the life of God. They only have their individual psyche, their soul or human life, and they each need to protect their separate selves and so fear enters the picture, followed by enmity.
Adam blames Eve and Eve blames the serpent. The humans have become each an individual island, in conflict with one another, and in Genesis 4, the separateness ultimately culminates in jealousy and murder, as Cain kills his brother Abel. Not only is the intimate union between God and humankind broken. The union between human beings is also broken, and so is the union between human beings and the earth and the animal kingdom. The earth, which God commissioned human beings to care for, we have exploited and ravaged to the point where the whole creation is groaning, as Paul puts it in Romans 8. Human beings are now characterised by what the Apostle Paul calls the old self, or the flesh. Sometimes it is called the false self. It is a corruption of what God created, it is subject to evil and death, and we are all infected with it, even though we are created in the image of God, and even though we have had an initial encounter with Jesus.
Let’s take a moment here to underline what the false self is like. First of all, as we have seen, it is characterised by a posture of separateness, from God and from other human beings. And because it is separate, like an island, it is afraid. We are afraid of God, our very source of real life, and we are afraid of one another. We are afraid that we have no real identity, and that we might not be valued, and so we have to find our identity in performance or in possessions, or in identification with a particular group. We are afraid of being hurt, and so we become defensive. We are afraid of being thwarted in our agenda, and so we manipulate. We are afraid of being in want, and so we hoard or indulge ourselves. We become twisted in our sexuality, and we become addicted to everything under the sun. We are afraid of death. Isn’t it significant that when God sends an angel to someone or to a group of people, the first thing the angel says is, “Fear Not!”
The second major characteristic of the false self is that it is angry. It is angry because it is fearful. In everyday life, this anger comes out particularly in our relationships with those who are closest to us, because we need to protect ourselves and maintain our supremacy. It manifests itself in resentment and unforgiveness in the family, in the Church and between ethnic and social groups. On the highway, it manifests itself in our driving. When two or more false selves collide in whatever setting, we get hostility of every kind, both verbal and physical. We need control, and when our control is thwarted we lash out in some way, or withdraw, or manipulate.
In the Gospels, we see the flesh, the old man or the false self played out particularly in the Pharisees, in their self-righteousness, their group mentality as over against “sinners” and in their hatred of Jesus, who threatens to upset their control, their religious system, their very lives. We see it in the disciples when they want the best place for themselves in the coming Kingdom. The frightening thing is that these are all religious people. Very orthodox.
The natural outcome of this kind of self-life, which we all possess, is death. Now this is where Jesus comes into the picture. Jesus is fully human, but without the twistedness that we have been describing. He is also fully God. Therefore, in a way we can’t begin to understand, he is able to take into himself on the cross all the twistedness and agony of the whole creation. He is able to take into himself the whole infection of twisted humanity. That’s what constitutes the unfathomable agony of the cross. But Jesus comes out on the other side of death into Life, real Life, bringing his humanity with him. And something else happens here, something that is also a mystery beyond our understanding. Paul puts it this way in Romans 6. He says that our old self was actually crucified with Christ. When Jesus died, we died. That’s the extent to which Christ identified with us. But not only do we share in his death, we also share in his Resurrection. His resurrected Life, his Zoe, is available to us now. We share in his Resurrection now, and we will share in the reality of his physical Resurrection at the time of his physical return.
However, although the old self has been crucified with Christ in the larger scheme of things, in the day-by-day scheme of things, it is very much alive, and in conflict with the new self that Christ is creating within us. This is the state of affairs that Paul describes in Romans 7, when he cries out, “I find myself doing the things I don’t want to do, and the things I want to do, I don’t seem able to do! Who will rescue me from this dilemma?” And then he seems to sigh with relief, as he exclaims, “I thank God, through Jesus Christ my Lord!”
What Jesus is inviting us to do then, in this passage from Matthew 16, is to actualise, day by day, the death of our old or false self, and to walk in his Life (his Zoe); that is, to walk in our new self. Now what does he means when he tells us to take up our cross day by day and follow him? Often a criminal was forced to carry the crosspiece of his own instrument of death, as Jesus himself had to do until he fell down under it. So what is our cross? I really have pondered this question. I think it may have to do with those things in our lives that we would never choose to bear, if we had the choice, but that we can’t change. For me, an example would be my severe hearing loss. Even with an expensive hearing aid, I experience frustration every day because of it, and often shame and embarrassment when I hear inaccurately. In the old self, I respond to this problem by withdrawing or becoming resentful or by blaming those close to me for not speaking clearly. If I am walking in the new self, animated by the life of Jesus, I am able to grow in grace through this frustration.
So what are the practicalities here? How do we die day by day to the old self and walk in the new self that God is creating in us? How do we lose our (old) self so that we may find our (new) self, and walk in the resurrected Life, the Zoe, of Jesus? I think we need to say at the outset that we can’t do it though willpower, and we can’t do it through guilt. Neither will work as motivators. Nor can we do it as lone wolves or as church gypsies. The life of Jesus is always expressed in community, even and especially with all the frustrations that rubbing elbows with one another implies. Incidentally, one of the crosses that David and I carry is that we are not able to be here day-by-day with you here because our house in Qualicum Beach has not sold. And how we deal with that fact day by day is an exercise in dying to our old selves and walking in our new selves, or not.
So how do we deny the old self and live in the new self that God is creating in us? And here I really have to confess that I am as much in process as anyone else in this place. What is foundational, I think, is to experience the love of God for us, to know the love of Jesus experientially. We have to know experientially that we are loved before we can really trust and follow. We have to know the security of being loved, even when we mess up. The word “know” when it is used in the Bible means much more than knowing intellectually. It means to know with our whole being. If one of my children were to say, “I know intellectually that Mum loves me, but I don’t feel her love”, I would be devastated, and my loving them would make no difference to them at all. And yet many of us have to say, “I know Jesus loves me, but actually I don’t experience his love”. Paul’s prayer in Ephesians 3 is that we, being rooted and grounded in love, may have the power to grasp how long and wide and deep and high is the love of Christ for us, and to know this love, which surpasses knowledge. What Paul is talking about here is the passionate love of Christ for each single person, as well as for the Church communally. That kind of love, that kind of belovedness, is very hard to grasp. Even though we have had very loving parents, we have tended, even as children, to believe that if we behave well, we will be loved more, and if we misbehave, love will be withdrawn from us. To know experientially that Jesus loves us so much that he could not love us more (or less) no matter what we do, that kind of love is very hard to take in. We have to literally take the time to sit still and gaze at Jesus gazing at us, so that by grace his love can begin to penetrate our inner being.
The story is told of an old peasant who came every evening on his way home from the fields, to sit for a few minutes in the parish church. Then he would quietly leave. The parish priest became curious about what the man was doing, and so he asked, “Why do you come here every evening at the end of the day?” The peasant smiled and replied, “I just look at Jesus, and he looks at me, and I am happy”.
And as we internalize the love of Jesus for us, we are increasingly able to respond to it; to love Jesus back, and then to reach out in love horizontally to one another, and to forgive. In turn, the spilling out of Christ’s love through us ignites in our sisters and brothers the heart-knowledge of their belovedness in Christ. Being loved by other people is a powerful way to experience the love of God. And thirdly, it is helpful to remember by grace, especially at the end of the day, the times that day when we have been aware of God’s loving presence with us, to give thanks for those moments and to re-live them, because those are the times when we are walking in the new self. Those are the times when we are walking in the resurrected Life, the Zoe, of Jesus. Amen.
Irene Gifford-Cole
11 Pentecost Year A
St. Peter’s Comox, Aug. 28, 2011
Comments