Göttinger Predigten im Internet
ed. by U. Nembach, J. Neukirch, C. Dinkel, I. Karle

Second Sunday in Lent, March 12, 2006
Sermon on Mark 8:31-38 by Samuel D. Zumwalt
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Mark 8:31-38 [NRSV Text from BibleWorks]

31 Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32 He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33 But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, "Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things." 34 He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35 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. 36 For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? 37 Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? 38 Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels."

LOSING

In the name of the Father, and of the +Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Losing is anathema to us Americans. That is why the Lord Jesus’ words fall so hard on our ears: “…those who want to save their life will lose it!”

What father tells his child, “Now go out and lose the game for your Mom and Dad today – make us proud?” What guy comes leaping through the office door on Monday morning shouting enthusiastically, “Yeah! My team got beat to a bloody pulp this weekend?” What fan says to her friends, “My team has lost every game this year – it doesn’t get any better than this?” What university says, “We’ve never had a coach lose as many games as this – we’ve got to give this guy a huge pay raise?”

Americans hate to lose. Just mention Viet Nam to any retired military man and you’ll probably hear some ugly words about weak politicians. Just mention the dot.com debacle of the late 1990s and watch investors heads begin to spin around. Just mention the Chicago Cubs to any north side Chicagoan and listen to them lament the curse.

The Lord Jesus’ words about losing have always fallen hard on American ears. They’ve all but been forgotten by the power-of-positive-thinking preachers like Norman Vincent Peale or Robert Schuler. Go to any suburban megachurch anywhere in this country and you just won’t hear very many sermons that focus on losing your life with Jesus. Instead it’s all about winning. Prosperity preachers act as if what Jesus meant was that he wants to make everyone rich. One of the most famous of their sermons was entitled, “Acres and Acres of Diamonds.” Americans just don’t like to lose – not even if it’s for Jesus’ sake!

Talk about your radical disconnect! You have the Lord Jesus saying, “Come, die with me!” And then you have plenty of preachers and plenty of Christians who act as if the Lord Jesus lived to a ripe old age at an exclusive island resort where He wrote a book entitled Memoirs of the Successful Son of God.

Of course, as we listen to today’s Gospel reading, we can’t help but notice that Simon Peter and the other disciples didn’t exactly cotton to the Lord Jesus’ words. Jesus hardly got the words about suffering and being killed out of his mouth before Peter was taking Him aside saying, “Ix nay on the dying stuff. It brings the other fellows down!”

Notice how the Lord Jesus responds. He doesn’t take coaching well. In fact, the human resources people at most companies would say, “We’re just not going to be able to keep this guy Jesus. Look at the way He uses abusive language especially with those that don’t agree with Him. He perceives them as adversaries. Sorry we just can’t have a guy on our team that says things like: ‘Get behind me, Satan!’ The name-calling, the quick trigger temper, and the lone wolf stuff just don’t fit into our vision!”

But, if you notice, when you’re the Son of God, you just don’t spend a whole lot of time seeking other’s approval. Incorrigible to the end, the Lord Jesus gathers not only His closest followers around Him – He gathers the whole crowd just like a coach at a pep rally: “Listen up, everybody; I’m going to say this loud and clear.”

[The following translation is from Eugene Peterson’s The Message.] “Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat; I am. Don’t run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I’ll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to saving yourself, your true self. What good would it do to get everything you want and lose you, the real you? What could you ever trade your soul for? If any of you are embarrassed over me and the way I’m leading you when you get around your fickle and unfocused friends, know that you’ll be an even greater embarrassment to the Son of Man when he arrives in all the splendor of God, his Father, with an army of the holy angels.”

His words don’t fall easily on American ears, obsessed as we are with hearing leaders talk about winning. But as He speaks, we can’t help but hear the Spirit tugging at our yearning hearts. The Lord Jesus not only speaks the truth. He is, as John’s Gospel says, “the way, the truth, and the life.” If you go with Him, you will find real life.

Real life, the life of a disciple, a follower of Jesus, looks like the man who, after becoming a regular Bible reader, gave up a lucrative beer distributorship because he couldn’t stand the thought of one more death caused by alcohol that he had sold. It looks like the high-powered business executive that started spending his vacation time in Honduras helping to provide a school for some of the poorest children on this side of the world. It looks like the woman that loses a marriage because she refuses to participate in the party lifestyle of her husband. It looks like the teen who doesn’t get asked to the prom because everyone knows she intends to remain a virgin until she is married.

Real life, the life of a disciple, a follower of Jesus, looks like the church youth group that helps clean up after Hurricane Katrina instead of flying off to some luxury resort or some fun-filled national youth gathering. It looks like a devout young preacher that can’t get another call because a synod office has decided he’s not liberal enough to suit them. It looks like a seminary professor that is asked to take early retirement because his traditional preaching and teaching doesn’t fit with the faculty majority’s revisionist vision of the church.

Real life, the life of a disciple, a follower of Jesus, looks like the parishioner that spends hours caring for his wife, an Alzheimer’s patient. It looks like the Christian parents that give their lives caring for their chronically ill child. It looks like the mother that gets her children ready for church and takes them by herself while her husband goes to play with the boys. It looks like the parishioner, a single-parent that works two or more jobs just to provide for her children with no help from a dead-beat dad or mom. It looks like the congregation that says we will do whatever it takes to make sure that families with sick children have the spiritual, emotional, and financial help they need.

In short, the real life for which you and I were made is about following Jesus in a life of humble service. It’s about finding that most of the things the people around you talk about and worry about are more like a mirage in a desert. They fade away the closer that you get to them. Which would you be prouder of at the end of your life, owning a Rolex watch or having given the same amount of money for African children with AIDS?

The Son of God, Jesus, didn’t just give His life on the cross for those that follow Him in lives of humble service. He died for the sins of the whole world – including those that are so busy winning that they only dabble at being generous, those that make their living destroying lives and communities, those that alter His words to soothe the itching ears of the self-centered, and those whose whole existence is devoted to selling people empty dreams that won’t do any real good for anyone.

When you and I were buried with Him in the washing of Holy Baptism, we were claimed as beloved daughters and sons of God. And on that day we began what was meant to be a lifelong pattern of losing our lives with the Lord Jesus Christ. And if we refuse to continue that pattern, we are as foolish as that man in one of Jesus’ stories who built bigger and bigger storage units until that night, when they were finally full, he dropped dead before he could enjoy his riches. Being baptized into Jesus’ death and resurrection means dying to my selfish self daily in order to become the real me!

Several years ago, Chicago pastor F. Dean Lueking wrote a book on preaching. In it he told the story of a well-known theologian that cared for his wife while she was dying of cancer. The night that she died, her husband stayed by her bed for hours stroking her hair and repeating the words: “You love Jesus, and Jesus loves you.”

During the past year, we have said that we are a discipleship center – a congregation that wants to help people follow Jesus in lives of humble service. We have said that disciples pray daily, worship every week, read the Bible, serve at and beyond St. Matthew’s, are in relationships that help others grow spiritually, and give generously of time, talent, and treasure. We have given out cards with those words. We have printed those words in our weekend bulletins. And perhaps those words haven’t yet grabbed and stirred your imagination, because the simplest and key ingredient seemed to be missing for you. Why? The answer is very simple: Because you love Jesus and Jesus loves you!

When you and I come to Holy Communion, we always come with nothing in our hands, because we cannot buy God’s love in Jesus Christ. It’s a free gift to be received by people like us that don’t deserve it. When we receive the bread and the wine, we receive Jesus. Once again He takes all of our sins, all of our shortcomings, all of our failures, all of our good intentions that fell short – He takes them all to His cross. He says, “I love you so much that I died to take away all of your sins. I love you, and I forgive you!”

When we leave from this altar and from this building today, the Lord Jesus goes with us to give us power to give our lives away in humble service. The Holy Spirit prays with us and for us so that we will be able to lose the selfish attitude that pervades our American culture, lose the fear of commitment to God and others, lose the love of persistent sinning, and lose the desire always to win at any cost no matter whom it hurts.

You love Jesus, and Jesus loves you! Go! Give your life away in His name and discover who you really are – a child of God!

In the name of the Father, and of the +Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

© Samuel D. Zumwalt
szumwalt@bellsouth.net
St. Matthew’s Evangelical Lutheran Church
Wilmington , North Carolina
[An mp3 version of this sermon will be available by 8 p.m. EST Saturday at www.stmatthewch.org]

 


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