Preaching text: Matthew 16:21-28
Last Sunday, as you’ll recall, I took issue with two variant
interpretations of Christianity. I called out by name Joel Osteen and those
like him who preach a prosperity gospel, the idea that God is merely a means to
an end, little more than a path to riches and success. I also called out
Christian fundamentalism, with its focus on exclusion and self-righteousness,
seeing God as little more than a cruel judge of those who don’t measure up to
the fundamentalist standard.
I think I preached that sermon a week too early, because
both groups got plenty of press this week, much of it focused EXACTLY on what I
find so problematic about both groups.
Osteen, of course, has had the most press. His massive
mega-church, which can seat nearly 20,000 people, is located in the heart of
Houston, TX, right smack dab in the middle of the nightmare that is Hurricane
Harvey. The fourth largest city in our country has been bombarded with rain and
flooding the likes of which even Noah has never seen. People are in desperate need
of shelter from the storm and the floods. And here, at a time when the church
could do tremendous good for people in need, Osteen’s church was locked up
tight. It opened only after a massive outpouring of shame was heaped upon
Osteen for his heartlessness.
That shouldn’t surprise anyone. When your God is money and
success, what do you do with suffering and need? Are they not, in their
theological understanding, proof positive of God’s displeasure? Why help them
when they’re getting what they deserve? Failure is for losers and those out in
those flood waters are clearly losing.
Meanwhile, a coalition of fundamentalist Christians released
this week what is called the Nashville Statement, their manifesto against any
and all things LGBTQ. This didn’t get nearly as much press as Osteen, but it is
not much different in spirit than his locked doors. Stay out, gay people. We
don’t want you. And if you come, be prepared to be treated as second class
Christians at best, pariahs at worst. God’s judgment is upon you. Repent of
your inborn sexuality or else.
A manifesto of hate. If you’re not like us, if you’re one of
them or someone who dares support one of them, then you can (quite literally) go to hell.
I could not have asked for two better examples of precisely
why I feel these sorts of churches do not know Jesus. Who do say that I am? Sadly, it does not seem to be the Christ of the Gospels.
Our Gospel text today highlights precisely who the Christ of
Gospels truly is. Yes, Peter has staked his claim in his confession from last
week, but even he doesn’t quite grasp fully who and what Jesus is. Now Jesus
explains in fullness what this is all about. “From this time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to
Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders…” To be
the Christ, the son of the living God, is to go to the cross, die, and then
rise again on the third day.
Peter, of course, won’t have it. To die is to be defeated,
to fail, to be overcome by the evils we good people are meant to stamp out. No,
that’s the world’s way of thinking. Jesus has come to show us God’s way of
thinking. Peter would not be alone. To Osteen, death is losing. There is no
losing when holiness is success, wealth, and power. To those who signed the
Nashville Statement, death is defeat. Evil cannot triumph. We’re the good guys,
we’re better than those horrid sinners. They can’t win.
Nor would these two groups be the only ones guilty of thinking like Peter. How often do we see death as failure or loss? How often do we see faith as a means to success or victory over our worldly enemies (real or imagined)?
If so, we've utterly missed the point. It’s not about winning or
losing. It’s not about my success or my triumph over those different from me.
It’s about saving the whole world. It was always about saving the whole world.
It is STILL about saving the whole world.
Remember again that text I frequently quote from Genesis.
Genesis 12:3. “I will bless those who bless you and the one who curses you I
will curse and in you ALL THE FAMILIES OF THE EARTH SHALL BE BLESSED.” That,
right there at the very beginning of the story of God’s people, is the purpose
of Jesus: to be that blessing that will be for all the world.
And that’s why he does what he does. It’s why Jesus was
born. It’s why he lived and taught and performed his miracles. It’s why he does
go to the cross and undergoes great suffering. And even in the midst of his
greatest pain, he speaks a word of mercy and compassion. “Father, forgive
them.” He dies and on the third day, he does rise again.
Everything Jesus is about is his mission to save the world.
That’s who he is. That’s what he’s about. I chuckle every now and then, because
on my Facebook feed will come this advertisement for a t-shirt that shows Jesus
surrounded by all these superheroes: Batman, Spiderman, the Hulk, you name it.
And there’s a speech bubble above Jesus’ head and it reads “And that’s how I
saved the world.” I love it. That’s him. That is who he is.
And, as the verses that follow imply, that is who we are to
be also. We too must take up our cross and do all that we can to save the
world. Now we don’t have duplicate Jesus’ sacrifice. His salvation is won and
that part is done and complete. But we have this moment, here and now, in a
dying and hurting world. What are we going to do to follow our savior? What are
we going to do in this moment right now to save the world for someone in need?
Heh, I said last week that “What now?”, our fundamental
question, followed directly from Jesus’ question of “Who do you say that I am?”
Here you see that. Christ gave his whole self for the sake of those he loved
and calls us to do the same. Houston is underwater. People are saying “black
lives matter” because so many black lives are being killed. There is war in
Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan. The KKK and the Nazis are arising anew. There is no
lack of work for us to love those who need love. No lack of work for us to feed
those who need fed. The Gospel needs to go forth. The world needs it. The world
needs to know of the Christ who came to save it. What are we going to do about
that? Amen.
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