Lent 2 B

Here’s another promise. God made a promise to a man long ago named Abram. Along with Christians around the world, during these weeks of Lent, we hear readings of God’s covenants, or promises, with God’s people. And God’s promise to Abram was so big that it required a name change. Now named Abraham, he found out that it would be him that God would use to make an entire nation of people.

You wonder if Abraham fully grasped what this would mean. That in 2015, billions of people and three major world religions all claim Abraham as their ancestor.

Faced with a responsibility like that, as Abraham was, I think I might lock myself in my room and just never come out. But Abraham takes a risk. God says ‘go, ‘ without even saying where to and Abraham just starts going.

What could possibly accompany Abraham on his journey through the wilderness to keep him going?

The Apostle Paul tells us in the book of Romans that it was faith. Faith is what motivated and sustained Abraham through the ups and downs he faced … over a long period of time. And Paul clarifies what Faith is. Faith is trust in God. Apart from the law or works or intellectual beliefs. Faith was not about believing strongly enough in the destination to make it come true. Sometimes we think that […] Abraham, on the other hand, didn’t know at all what the ending would look like when he had faith in God. Faith is deeper, it is a relationship with God.

And a specific kind of relationship. Faith is a relationship in which God is God, and we are God’s people.

When God makes his promise to Abraham, he says this, which always jumps out at me: God says, “I will be God to you.”

[…]

It was not Abraham’s superiority, but his relationship with God that gave him faith. And faith called Abraham into action, hoping against hope.

Faith is not a part of life, as in, “this is my profession, and these are my hobbies, and this is my faith.” Faith is trusting in God’s promise for all of life. And it may even require you to put your life on the line.

For Abraham, it meant leaving home and going on a trip that would change the course of his life. And then at 99 years old, finding out that he and his wife Sarah would be parents of a child! At 99. Surprise!

World events have called our attention to Christians in Syria and Iraq that risk their lives just by professing their faith in Christ. For the 21 Coptic Christians who were killed for all the world to see, faith was clearly not a simple set of beliefs, or rules to follow, but trust in God’s promises. Trust in God’s relationship. Their faith indeed was what Martin Luther called a ‘… living, daring confidence in God’s grace … so certain, that someone would die a thousand times for it.’

Faith is trusting in God’s faithfulness … even through the darkest moments. Those who have given up their lives in faith call us to consider what faith means for our lives.

Eight chapters into the Gospel of Mark and Jesus has accomplished a lot. He has encountered great challenges and overcome them. He’s healed individuals, he’s outsmarted his detractors, he’s fed thousands of people miraculously.

And the disciples, who have a habit of being confused, may finally be catching on: when Jesus asked them, “who do you say that I am?” Peter answers: “you are the messiah.” Peter pledges that he has put his faith, his trust in Jesus.

And then Jesus confuses them again. Jesus begins to teach them that he — teacher, healer, miracle worker, even messiah — must suffer, be rejected, be killed, and rise again. And it’s too much for Peter. Peter, who with the other disciples, has hitched his wagons to Jesus. Peter has made the startling and serious confession that Jesus is the messiah. The one that all have been waiting for. And besides that, Jesus is a friend.

Maybe Peter can cheer him up and make Jesus realize that’s he’s been doing great things, and the disciples, though confused, really do love him, and really need him to stay out of serious trouble so that they can continue all the good work they’ve been doing. But for Jesus, the mission never really was about accomplishments, or doing the most work, or being the best. The mission is to take the Good News on a course that passes right through suffering, rejection, and death so that there is good news, even there. To show that God’s covenant extends to the darkest moments. And Peter’s temptation to bypass this hard part earns him a stern rebuke from Jesus. “Get behind me Satan.”

Ouch. Peter must have touched a nerve to be called Satan, and in fact, he has. In his resistance, Peter has become the spokesman for the most perilous path a disciple can take — to look for glory instead of the cross.

But, see, it’s at the cross that Jesus renews God’s covenant with all people. It’s at the cross that Jesus shows us once and for all that there is nowhere God will not go to love us back to life; to repeat God’s promise to Abraham and to all people — “I will be God to you. Even here. In the good and the bad. In life and in death.”

This kind of self-giving love is what defines God’s love for us. It’s what defines the mission of Jesus. And it’s what defines being a follower of Christ.

After Jesus scolds Peter, he addresses him, and the disciples, and he includes the crowd, which I believe means us, too, and says:

If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and 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, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.

It’s not just Peter that struggles with this. The temptation to put down the cross and opt for saving our own lives is always with us. It’s the temptation to forget what our relationship with God really is. To think that we can do it all ourselves. It’s a constant temptation for churches:

On the one hand, the Church is called to grow, baptizing all the world into God’s family… on the other hand, the Church is called to deny itself, to lay down its life for the sake of the Gospel. […]

Churches can build and develop and organize for mission, but they can also succumb to Peter’s temptation. They can focus on themselves, and their own glory. They work to retain what they have. To protect themselves. To try to save their own lives.

As a congregation, we need to be constantly reminded that we are called together to deny ourselves (it’s not about us!), to take up our cross (to embrace what may be difficult and scary) and to follow Jesus. Every congregation faces the constant tendency to move the focus inward, on ourselves, instead of out towards where Jesus would lead us. Congregations, too, must put their lives on the line.

Ask yourself for just a moment… what do you suppose this congregation would be willing to give up for the sake of the gospel?

Bishop Mike of the Gulf Coast synod:

The world is hell-bent on destruction in countless ways. It is desperately in need of a church that offers a Way of peace, truth, compassion and hope, as opposed to the world’s way of power, materialism, exploitation and violence. It needs leaders willing to risk comfort, status and economic security for the life of the world and the outreach potential of the church. It needs a church that looks less like the Pharisees’ religion and more like Jesus’ ministry. It needs a church that is willing to sacrifice everything for those outside: buildings, budgets, sacred cows, traditions, structures. It needs a church that so loves the world, that she’d be willing to die for it. (Bishop Mike Reinhart)

Now, I’m not saying we shouldn’t care or respect or appreciate all that this congregation has and does. Denying ourselves, laying down our lives does not mean these things do not matter. They matter immensely: for the sake of the world. Our congregation, our relationships, our roof, our history — these things matter! They matter for the sake of the gospel.

How we use these things changes through time as we constantly take back up our cross and follow Jesus. We constantly ask, ‘how can we use what we have — not for our own glory — but so that everyone around us can know the relationship that we are called into. The relationship that gave faith to Abraham, to the martyrs, to us. The promise that God has made for all: in rejoicing and suffering, in giving, in living, in dying: God says, I will be God to you.