He Still Asks!
Dr. Jim Wilson, September 13, 2009 Dr. Eugene Hellmich had a peculiar habit. Dr. Hellmich was the head of the Math Department at Northern Illinois University and a nationally recognized leader in the field of math education. If you were a NIU student wanting to teach math, you had to survive methods classes with Dr. Hellmich, usually with fear and trembling. I was more intimidated by his classes than those in Advanced Calculus or Differential Equations. But, I did survive. Now for the peculiar habit. Dr. Hellmich never answered a student’s question. Whenever a student asked a question, Dr. Hellmich responded with a question, a question designed to force the student to think, to consider possible solutions, to weigh the implications of those potential solutions, and to arrive at an answer. Socrates may have invented the method, after all we call it “The Socratic Method,” but I am convinced Dr. Hellmich perfected it. That process frustrated me. I just wanted a simple, direct answer to my question. But no, not from Dr. Hellmich---I just got another question to deal with. It was only from the perspective of time, and, I have to admit, maturity, that I came to appreciate the process, and even Dr. Hellmich. I don’t know if or how well Dr. Hellmich knew Jesus---that is a question I never asked. However, Jesus too loved to ask questions, questions that forced people to think. “Why are you afraid?” “Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar?” “Why does this generation seek a sign?” “Who are my mother and brothers?” “For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life?” “Why is it that you can see the speck in your brother or sister’s eyes and not the log in your own?” These questions asked by Jesus and dozens of other fill the pages of the Gospels. Each of them seeks to engage the listener to consider potential answers, and to weigh the implications as they move toward a faithful response. Sometimes I wish Jesus would just give a straight answer when he is asked a question, and he does on occasion, but more often he simply asks a question in return. But then I guess Jesus wants disciples who can come to answers and own them; disciples who have seriously grappled with the implications of answers to big questions. This is certainly the case in our text for this morning. The questions are asked as Jesus and the disciples walk along a dusty road that leads through the villages of Caesarea Philippi, near what is now the Golan Heights. As they walk, Jesus asks a question, one that would make any pollster proud: “Who do people say that I am?” “What is the word on the street about me?” “What are people Twittering about me?” An interesting question, one prompted perhaps by the geography. This is border country, the boundaries between Jew and Gentile, a place ripe with Baal worship, Roman gods, and local deities. Such is life in the border country. It is important to be clear about identity in such geography. The disciples without hesitation, suggesting they have had their ear to the ground, offer what they have heard: “John the Baptist, and others Elijah, and still others, one of the prophets.” Interesting answers, all of which identify Jesus with the forerunner to the Messiah, not the Messiah himself. So, Jesus poses a second question, a question that demands a more personal and a more existential response: “Who do you say that I am?” With his customary boldness, Peter answers, “You are the Messiah.” Was this a flash of insight? A lucky guess? A new found faith? Whichever it was, it represents the first recorded confession of Jesus as the Messiah. Now you would think that would call for a celebration, or at least a word of congratulations. Not so in Mark. Jesus makes no acknowledgment of Peter’s confession. He simply orders them to silence, to tell no one about him. Now, I have a hunch that about now, Jesus might have asked another question, though it is not recorded in Mark. The question might have been something like this: “Do you understand what kind of Messiah I intend to be?” I suggest this because Jesus begins to explain he is not the Messiah of common expectations, the Messiah of nationalistic hopes. Nor is he a political Messiah, one who will call Israel to rise up and throw off Roman tyranny. Instead, he is to be a Messiah who will suffer, who will be rejected by the religious leaders, who will die, and who will rise after three days. This is more than poor Peter can stand. He pulls Jesus aside and rebukes him. Jesus, in turn, rebukes Peter in the strongest of language: “Get behind me, Satan. You have your mind set not on God’s things but on human things.” Peter got the title right but its meaning was wrong, the answer was right, the understanding was wrong. His image of the Messiah did not include suffering, rejection, and death. This leads to yet another question Jesus might have asked, again one not reported. It might have been something like this: “Do you have any idea what confessing me as God’s Messiah will mean for your life?” My guess is that the disciples just stand there dumbfounded. So, Jesus says, “If any want to follow me---that is be my disciples---let them deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow me.” Answers have implications. To call Jesus Messiah and mean it, is a call to a particular way of life, a way of life centered in self denial; that is the surrender of self assertion before God and surrender of autonomous freedom which directs itself against God; and to cross-bearing; that is self-giving service. Not a life of comfort is this life to which Christ Jesus calls us. Yet, it is the way to life, to real, authentic life, as Jesus announces: “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.” That is the paradox. The more tightly one tries to hold on to life, the more it will be lost. Real and full life, says Jesus, is experienced when we walk with him, forgetting ourselves and serving others. Well, I would think the disciples have much to ponder. I would think we do as well. You see, Jesus still asks these questions. He asks them to you and to me this morning. He asks us, “Who do you say that I am?” I believe this is the fundamental faith question for Christians: “Who do you say Jesus is?” When all is said and done, the Christian faith is all about our Christology; that is what we say about Jesus. As I listen, I hear all kinds of answers: a teacher, a moral example, a prophet, a revolutionary, a model of the successful life, the answer to all my problems---and the list goes on. How would you answer if you stood before Jesus and he looked you right in the eye and asked, “Who do you say that I am?” Ok, we’ve read the book, saw the movie, heard to story, we know the right answer: “You are the Messiah, the Christ of God, the Lord.” Now some think that is the end of it, all there is to it. “I’ve confessed Jesus is Lord,” said Bill, “What more do you want me to do?” I said quietly and gently, “Bill, I expect you to do what I believe Jesus expects you to do and that is live a life consistent with your confession.” If Jesus is really the Lord of our life, shouldn’t it be evident in how we live? Again, I want to emphasize that the fundamental confession of our faith is that Jesus is Lord, the Christ of God. A newspaper reported once commented to a colleague, “What difference does it make what we say about Jesus? Friend? Prophet? Lord? Revolutionary? They are all true.” Arthur replied, “It makes all the difference in the world. There are many friends, many prophets, many revolutionaries, but there is one and only one who is Lord and he is Jesus Christ!” But as Peter demonstrated it is not enough to know the right answer. There are implications to that answer. And that leads to a second question I hear Jesus asking you and me. “What kind of Messiah do you think I am?” Peter wanted Jesus to be a nationalistic Messiah, a political/military Messiah who would lead Israel in an overthrow of Roman oppression, and restore Israel to greatness. Jesus said, “No, I am not that Messiah.” What kind of Messiah do we want Jesus to be? What are our hopes and expectations? A defender of the American Way of Life? The One who satisfies my wishes? A Champion of Capitalism? A proponent of Liberalism? A coach for success? We have our expectations. But Jesus says, No, I am not these Messiahs. Here is the Messiah I am. I suffer with those who suffer to redeem their suffering. I walk with the oppressed to set them free. I linger with the lonely to comfort them. I sit with the ill to bring healing to them. I wrap my arms around the hopeless to bring hope. I stay with those who sorrow to bring peace. I die with those who walk in the Valley of the Shadows, to bring new life. This is the Lord I am, the One who brings God’s liberating, transforming, life-changing, hope-giving love to his people. Not our usual image of the Lord! Can you confess this One as Lord? The confession has implications. And that leads to a third question I hear Jesus asking. He asks, “Do you have any idea of what calling me Lord means for your life?” The confession is not the end of the journey. It is the beginning. There are those who seem to believe that once a person “accepts Christ as their Savior” or “are saved” that nothing more is expected. “Not so,” says Jesus, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” Jesus says, the answer that he is the Messiah had definite implications for our lives. It is a call to walk in ways that deny self and give of self in cross-bearing service to others, both of which run counter to the “Me First” narcissism, consumer religion and privatized faith that are so much a part of our culture. As disciples we are to make a difference. Again, our answers have implications. Discipleship is definitely not for the faint of heart of the weak of knee. Being a disciple of Jesus Christ means we follow him, we take our job description from him, or as one writer suggests, “We pickle ourselves in the Gospels.” It is not a life of comfort or success as the world defines it. As I write this sermon, the services of remembrance for this day we know as simply 911 are filling the airways and the TV screens. Again, and rightfully so, the stories of those who gave their lives to save others on that fateful day are being honored: the flight attendants, the pilots, the firefighters, the police officers, the EMTs and the ordinary citizens. We know many of these people were religious and acted on their faith commitments. The Christians among them are models for us of how to live with integrity and faithfulness the confession that Jesus Christ is Lord, the Messiah. Jesus still asks the questions, he still asks “Who do you say that I am?” and “Will you live out your answer to that question?” He awaits our answers. Thanks be to God! Amen! |
