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| Get Behind Me, Satan!, James Tissot |
Faith is a crucial piece to the Christian walk. A truism, for sure. Faith is also a frustrating piece to the Christian walk. Perhaps not faith, but at least the way some Christians talk about faith, with statements like Just have faith or God has a plan and things will work out. I am certain that God does have a plan and I am equally certain that things will ultimately “work out” but I am nervous when our statement of faith gets tied up with such ideas. My adverb in the last sentence was intentional – ultimately. Today though, when I need faith, is penultimate. Today, in the penultimate moment, things ultimately working out may not seem that helpful to me. A lot of horrendous things happen on the way to the ultimate and, for all intents and purposes, it looks like things typically do not work out. What does faith mean during these moments?
Peter and Abraham are able to answer this question for us, albeit in very different ways. Abraham and Peter both talk with God in this week’s scripture readings. Abraham speaks with the LORD, who makes a covenant with him. Peter speaks with Jesus, who calls him Satan. I expect that each man was a bit puzzled during his encounter.
Shortly after Billy Graham passed away I read a few of his memorable quotes. Somehow I do not know Graham’s work well – neither his speaking nor his writing – so most of these quotes were entirely new to me. One in particular stood out: “I’ve read the last page of the Bible. It’s all going to turn out all right.” I love this quote because it does two things. It summarizes why I think faith is possible today, millennia after the Bible was written, and why I think faith is worthwhile. The last page of the Bible lets us see the end of the story that we are in right now. Knowing the stages of God’s story – creation, fall, redemption, return – eliminates the sense of randomness around me. This does not mean that the horrendous, or even the merely irritating, things we see around us are not actually bad or that God is indifferent. It does not mean that everything that happens is good. It also does not mean that in my lifetime I will see every dream come true and see a reason behind every tragedy and heartbreak and understand that they were in fact good things. What this does mean is that I know what story I am in. I am not the main character in this story and my name may not even show up on the closing credit reel; but, I am in this story, it is mine, and it ends well.
Peter, on the other hand, did not have the last page of the Bible and that is why I want to start with him and then move back to Abraham. Jesus tells his apostles that he will be killed and then, after three days, he would raise again. This is a paradigm shifting moment for Peter and he cannot handle this change. Peter does not yet understand what story he is in so he rebukes Jesus. Lord, he argues, the messiah cannot die. The messiah is going to lead us to triumph. You are going to lead us to triumph. Jesus rebukes Peter right back with what I think are the saddest words in scripture: Get behind me, Satan! Jesus is angry with his apostle – the man who many think was his best friend in the world – because Peter is part of a human story and Jesus is part of a God story. At this moment, Peter’s faith is misplaced. He does not understand what is promised to him and he is fierce in the defense of his error. (This will not be the last time, either, as a Roman soldier with a briefly missing ear would see later.)
Abraham was the first person to hear the story of which he, Peter, you, and I are a part. His bit of the story is where we learn about the promise Peter misunderstood. The LORD tells Abraham that he will be an ancestor to many nations and that this promise is not merely for Abraham and his wife but also for their many heirs. Among these heirs are kings and rulers. The old and childless Abraham and Sarah are about to become the ancestors of nations.
Peter, it seems, missed the “s”. Perhaps he was looking at the words kings and the rulers, stared the Messiah square in the eyes, and saw a crown for himself. The death of Jesus meant that this crown would remain on the head of Caesar and oppression would continue. The promise to Abraham, though, was for many nations, rather than simply one, to look to him as their father. Paul explains what this means in Romans. Evil is certainly a problem and Jesus is certainly going to deal with it. Evil, though, goes beyond the oppressors of the day so the method of dealing with it needs to be greater than simply taking the crown from Caesar and putting it on Peter and his friends. Paul explains that the consequence of sin is only dealt with in an ultimate sense through Jesus’ death, but that in Jesus’ resurrection sinners could be declared not guilty. With this, anyone who joins with Abraham in placing faith in the LORD, becomes one of his promised heirs. Abraham gives his ancestors a high standard to follow. Save for a couple instances, he held this faith pretty well throughout his life, including during a difficult moment when God ordered him to do something that would seemingly end the promise on the spot.
Peter began to understand the story a little bit better on Easter morning when he ran to find an empty grave. He understood it even better a few days later over breakfast. No longer a tempter of Jesus. Now the foundation of his church.
Where does this leave us now? We have two examples in front of us and both, by the end of their lives, could be called great exemplars of faith. That last page of the Bible seems to be a long way off, however. Perhaps it doesn’t only seem to be a long way off. It may be. Right now we are surrounded by evil in much the same way Peter was. Right now we have leaders that don’t seem to understand what Jesus was all about, much the same way Peter’s leaders did not understand. Right now, we have a choice to make. After calling one of his apostles Satan, Jesus explained how he was going to respond to evil with a challenge to the crowd. Let’s think about his words when we prepare to respond to a very evil world and a very weird political environment: take up your cross and follow Jesus; an attempt to save our life will cause us to lose it, while if we lose our lives for the sake of the gospel we will allow us to gain life; if we lose our soul to gain the world we are coming out with the short end of the stick; do not be ashamed of Jesus or his teaching unless you want him to be ashamed of you. These are the words Jesus spoke to defend his position immediately after being rebuked for announcing his upcoming death.
It is difficult 2000 years later. The last page of the Bible seems so far away, but so does the first Good Friday. The death of Jesus is discussed and written about so frequently now that it roles off the tongue and fingertips with an ease that I doubt Paul had holding quill to scroll writing to the Romans. It is hard to imagine how Jesus’ death could be a response to evil at all, let alone as the only complete response. Peter’s misplaced faith seemingly makes a lot of sense. The temptation to look for something more than Jesus is offering extends beyond Peter and is in front of us too.
So much of what surrounds us is trying to pull us into the middle of a human story and our calling is to trust Jesus enough to join him in his God story. Do we, or more pointedly, do I? Do I trust Jesus enough, do I have the faith necessary, to follow him on Good Friday? I need to be careful not to be too quick to answer with a yes that is not held up with careful consideration. I am told, after all, that trying to save my life will cause me to lose it. In that light, what does following Jesus to Good Friday mean when I am considering how to use my rights in a democracy? What does following Jesus to Good Friday mean when I am on Facebook and want to use the angry face reaction and comment bar to make my opinion known about whatever has captured the zeitgeist at the moment? What does following Jesus to Good Friday mean when I am talking about the Kingdom of God with a rich young ruler, with religious leaders, with a woman caught in adultery, or with my buddies? I am not entirely sure, but I hope I will recall Jesus’ rebuke of Peter and talk with the crowd when I feel the urge to defend myself or Jesus against a perceived, or even real, attack and use this recall as a place to start. Following Jesus and being a witness to his goodness should be my priority and I need to lose whatever gets in the way of this. Following Jesus to Good Friday is horrible, but the day he died was not the last day he lived.
Other reading:
Attribution for art work: Tissot, James, 1836-1902. Get Thee Behind Me, Satan!, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. http://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=56514 [retrieved February 25, 2018]. Original source:
Scripture readings are from the Revised Common Lectionary, Year B: https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu//lections.php?year=B&season=Lent
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