CONFRONTING THE WHOLE STORY
Author: Fr. Michael Byron
August 29, 2020
Boy, if I were to select bible readings for my Confirmation
day they wouldn’t be these! And in more normal times they wouldn’t be. But we
are expected to hear the whole story of our Jewish-Christian religion, and not
just the “happy-happy” ones. Today’s scripture readings are definitely not
happy-happy, but they are just as important. In fact they may be even more
important to keep before us because these are the readings that we don’t want
to hear. Everybody welcomes a story of happy-happy, but who wants to listen to
a story of danger and personal risk?
There was a story in the Star
Tribune this weekend that analyzed the two recent political conventions, and
the headline read like this:
“2 Parties offer stark contrast to
voters: Democrats focused on virus and social justice, while Republicans warned
of rioting and anarchy.”
All of these are people and candidates who are living in
exactly the same set of circumstances – in the United States in August 2020. The
only difference is what they choose to notice and speak up about in public. And
what stuff they ignore. And nobody want to speak about what is wrong unless it
can be made to be somebody else’s fault. Party conventions are the ultimate spinning
of stories – on both sides of the political spectrum.
But the bible won’t let us do that, and our Christian
commandments won’t allow us to be free from that responsibility either.
Baptism, Eucharist, and now Confirmation impose that duty. We often refer to
the Gospel of Jesus Christ as “Good New,” and rightly so. But it is good news
that is spoken to a world that is full of bad news – like sin and evil and fear
and doubt and deceit. Who needs or wants to hear about “Good News” if there’s
nothing threatening or messed up to begin with?
There is plenty of love and grace in this world – even now –
but that’s not the whole story. And the faithful followers of God who dare to
point that out always pay a price for that. It’s been happening for thousands
of years.
In today’s first reading from the Prophet Jeremiah, we hear
the anguished words of a man who believes that he has suffered enough for doing
the right thing. He has been commanded by God to go around Israel delivering hard
truth that people didn’t want to hear – like the impending destruction of the
Nation. Even that was not an invitation for people to despair. It was a
warning for people to change course, to come back to God while there was still
time. But they didn’t care to listen to that sort of thing, so they persecuted
the messenger instead. Jeremiah in this reading, has finally had enough, and he
cries out to God, “You tricked me! And I was foolish enough to let myself be
tricked!”
But as his complaining goes on, he comes to realize that it
was he who had misunderstood what it means to be a speaker of God’s word
to the world. He had thought that his job was only to proclaim “happy-happy”
good news, or that when he had to point out to people that some things were
wrong, they would thank him for the warning and change their way of life. But that’s
not what they did.
That’s still what many people don’t do now. They try to
trash the messenger rather than to listen to what is true – all of it… the good
and the bad, the joyful and the threatening.
It wasn’t much different for Jesus and his disciples in
today’s Gospel. Up to this point in Matthew’s Gospel Jesus’s followers had
witnessed a fair amount of “happy-happy.” The lord had been expelling demons,
curing the sick, walking on the water, feeding the 5,000 hungry people, and so
on. They all thought of him as a winner.
And he was, but that’s only half of the story. Today he
drops the other shoe and explains to them that he will have to suffer greatly –
not maybe, but necessarily, and that he will be executed before he is restored
to life. And his close friend St. Peter – he who could be called the apostle of
happy-happy – is not interested in listening to any of this. He attempts to
correct Jesus on this point, telling him that this prediction is not consistent
with the party platform of the Christian message, at least as Peter understands
it.
Jesus’s response is not just to correct his friend’s MISunderstanding,
but to double down in world that can only be heard as harsh:
“Get behind me Satan! You are an obstacle
to me. You are not thinking as God does, but as human beings do.”
And Jesus isn’t finished yet. He goes on to speak about
self-denial, losing one’s life in order to gain it, and contrasting personal
preferences with real human integrity – integrity which God will judge at the
end of life. That’s the whole story of our faith, and it includes necessary
suffering if we would presume to take it on.
That’s what our Confirmation Candidates are here to do today
– both to celebrate the happiness and welcome of completing Christian
initiation into our community, AND to take up the responsibility of being a
witness to God’s wish for you and for all of us in this world. It will surely
bring rich rewards, both now and the end of our lives. But there’s more to it than
happy-happy. There will be suffering as part of it, not maybe. We have Jesus’s
word on that – not because he wishes us to be in pain, but because in a world
infected by sin, this word from God will be resisted and sometimes rejected. It
happened to him. The gift of the Holy Spirit will help make you strong to
accept that.
Our suffering - your suffering - will take different forms.
- It may be social rejection or ridicule.
- It may be having to put up with physical or emotional hardship.
- It may be having to make the needs of others or of the community more important than your own personal preferences.
- It may be engaging in public protest that others will not understand.
- it may just be having to admit to another person that you've been wrong, and seeking forgiveness.
The Spirit will make you strong in the face of all of that.
Now that is “Good News.”
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