Sometimes, you can feel so many things at once, it’s hard to narrow it down to a single word or a single emotion. That’s what this past week has felt like for me.
In today’s readings we also encounter a broad spectrum of emotion: fear, love, frustration, happiness, despair, joy, and denial. Today God’s word shines a light on how complicated being human can be.
The prophet Jeremiah provides us with a classic example of lament. Jeremiah is pretty honest about his feelings of pain and frustration with God, “Truly, you are to me a deceitful brook, like waters that fail.”
By contrast, the psalmist strikes a chord of confidence, claiming, “I have walked faithfully with God…I have not consorted with the deceitful…I will not sit down with the wicked.” Yet even these words spoken to prove the psalmist’s faithfulness, are born out of a plea for justice.
In his letter to the Romans, St. Paul places an emphasis on love and the kinds of actions that follow when love is truly genuine. Paul’s words were addressed to believers in Rome during Nero’s reign. A context that fueled fear and despair demanded encouragement to respond to evil, suffering and persecution with perseverance and hope.
Speaking of fear, it’s what betrays Peter only moments after his profound profession of faith and the title of “rock” given to him by Jesus. His fear outweighs the faith he had just shown. His fear is what turns the “rock” into Satan, a stumbling block whose focus is on human things. Despite his good intentions, Peter obstructs Jesus and his mission.
It’s Peter’s struggle with fear that leads Jesus to deliver those well-known, yet troubling commands, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.” What does it mean to deny ourselves? What does it mean to take up our cross? What does it mean to lose our life in order to save it?
If we claim to be followers of Jesus, denying ourselves means putting others first and the needs of others before our own.
Here we are only a couple months removed from George Floyd and it’s happened again. The name–Jacob Blake–is different but the circumstance all too similar.
Now I know you’re tired of hearing it. I know I sound like a broken record. Maybe some of you wish I’d talk about something else, something uplifting. But, dear friends in Christ, as long as black women and men continue to be unjustly shot and killed, as long as we continue to wake up to horrific incidents that are symptoms of the evil of racism in our nation, I’m going to keep talking about it. And doing just that–just talking about it, engaging with it, listening to the people who truly fear for their lives every day, people like Jacob Blake, saying those three words black lives matter–these are concrete, actionable ways that we deny ourselves and lose our lives for the sake of others.
While headlines and stories about looting, violence, and rioting have grabbed the attention, thousands gathered and peacefully protested in Washington DC on the anniversary of the March on Washington 57 years ago to promote racial equality and police reform. And just days after Jacob Blake was shot seven times in front of his three sons, Blake’s mother had this to say, even as the violence spilled over and resulted in the death of two protestors–his mother said this, “Let’s begin to pray for healing for our nation…a house that is against each other cannot stand…to all the police officers, I’m praying for you and your families. To all the citizens, my black and brown sisters and brothers, I’m praying for you…Everybody, let’s use our hearts, our love and our intelligence to work together to show the rest of the world how humans are supposed to treat each other.”
Reminds me of St. Paul when he says, “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” Evil forces are captitalizing on fear, hatred, and division and it is tearing our communities apart. We are better than this. We need to be better than this. Overcoming evil with good starts with you and me.
Like Peter, it is easy, especially in these turbulent days, as we feel complicated, confusing and conflicting emotions, to let stumbling blocks get in our way and keep us from doing what Jesus asks of us. Despite our good intentions, it is easy for us to obstruct Jesus and his mission. So let’s throw those stumbling blocks out. Let’s be intentional about getting rid of the things that keep us focused only on ourselves. Let’s put aside our egos, our self-righteousness, our defensiveness, our denials, our judgments and our assumptions. Let’s listen and stop making it about me or us. Let’s put the lives of others and the well-being of our communities above our own. Let’s build that community of love that St. Paul describes. By doing this righteous work, by losing ourselves for the sake of Jesus and his gospel, for the sake of our neighbor, will we find new life.
The life of faith is never an easy one. There are always peaks and valleys. We are always awkwardly juggling everyday human experience with the invitation that flows from the waters of baptism, to follow Jesus’ lead, taking up our crosses for the sake of the world. Yet baptism helps us remember that while faith is a journey, it is also a relationship. For in baptism, we become children of God. We become sisters and brothers in Christ. And as Jeremiah finds out, we hear God speak our name and say, “I am with you.”