September 3, 2023 Sermon
Sermon title: "Get Behind Me, Satan!"
Scripture: Matthew 16:21-28
(Other lectionary suggestions include Exodus 3:1-15, portions of Psalm 105, and Romans 12:9-21.)
Matthew 16:21-28
Jesus Foretells His Death and Resurrection
21From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. 22And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, "God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you." 23But he turned and said to Peter, "Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things."
The Cross and Self-Denial
24Then Jesus told his disciples, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 25For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. 26For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life? 27"For the Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay everyone for what has been done. 28Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom."
How sad for Peter that Jesus has to say those words to him, especially right after Peter proclaimed that Jesus was the Messiah. But Jesus had to make clear what Messiahship for him meant, and it wasn't earthly military power and glory. As we know, it meant service, suffering, and even death. That's why we can almost imagine Peter putting his arm around Jesus and saying, "That isn't going to happen to you!" Peter and the rest of the disciples thought like the rest of the Jewish population, and that was that when the Messiah came, he would be like King David and put all of Israel's enemies - especially the Romans! - under their feet. But Jesus had to say in a hurry, THAT is not what my kingdom is about. If you want to be my disciple, said Jesus, you must deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me. (By the way, in Luke's Gospel, Luke has Jesus say "pick up your cross DAILY". Luke got it: temptation happens all the time - DAILY, in fact - and if we are going to be disciples, we need to be prepared DAILY to deny ourselves. Jesus could have also said, "Dudes! This ain't no walk in the park!")
Seriously, when Jesus says the word "satan", he doesn't mean DEVIL. The word "satan" simply means "adversary". Satan is any force which seeks to deflect us from the way of God. Says William Barclay, "Satan is any influence which seeks to make us turn back from the hard way that God has set before us; Satan is any power which seeks to make human desires take the place of the divine imperative."
Something else that makes this passage so poignant is that Peter LOVED Jesus, and only wanted what he thought was best for Jesus. And isn't that just like life? The hardest temptation of all may come from resisting what those who love us would have us do. Says, Barclay, "What really wounded Jesus' heart, and what really made him speak as he did, was that the tempter spoke to him that day through the fond but mistaken love of Peter's burning and impetuous heart".
A moment ago I mentioned Luke's Gospel and how he added DAILY to the phrase, "Pick up your cross and follow me". Something else is in Luke that is not in Matthew. After all the temptations Jesus endured in the wilderness, there is the verse that says Satan departed from Jesus UNTIL A MORE OPPORTUNE TIME. One of the painful things about Jesus telling Peter to "Get Behind Me, Satan" is that the very temptations Satan gave Jesus in the wilderness WERE NOW COMING FROM ONE OF JESUS' GREATEST DISCIPLES! Think of the pain Jesus must have felt. He had struggled for 40 days and nights and had overcome the temptations that Satan offered, and now here they were once again, except this time coming from a faithful disciple. There is a real sadness in this Jesus-Peter relationship. How hard it must have been for Jesus to have said those words to Peter, and how hard it must have been for Peter to have heard them. And listen again to the words of Jesus to his faithful disciple: "You are a hindrance to me, for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things." What this passage says to me is that it's the little things that separate us from God. And it's you and I doing those little things, not some evil monster with horns and a red tail! As the spiritual says, "Ain't my brother nor my sister, but it's ME, O Lord, standin' in the need of prayer." So sad! And we say that all we want for our loved one is the best for him/her. And I'm sure we are sincere! But what if GOD has spoken to this individual, and we are too blind to see? I have said this before, but George Frideric Handel's father wanted him to become a lawyer, but he wanted to become a musician and a composer. His father only wanted what he thought was best for his son. And aren't we glad that Handel listened to a different drummer or a distant drummer? Otherwise, we'd have no "Messiah" to sing at Chrismastime! No "Hallelujah!" chorus, no "He Shall Feed His Flock", no "All We Like Sheep" and all those other "Messiah" favorites. How about "And the Glory, the Glory of the Lord"? Our musical lives would have been so bleak without all that Handel gave us.....and I like to believe he listened to GOD and not man, to GOD instead of his earthly father who only wanted the best for his son.
I have mentioned William Willimon before. He taught at Duke, and he tells stories of kids coming to college, thinking about becoming doctors or lawyers. But they have a religion class or two, and suddenly they want to go to Haiti to help the poor there, or to some other far-off place to feed the hungry. And the parents of these kids (college students, really) come to Willimon to complain. "My daughter had a great future ahead of her", said one parent. "My son was all set to go to Harvard Law School", said another. Willimon has a great phrase for this change in a person's life. He says, "You never can tell what will happen once Jesus gets loose!" Isn't that a great phrase? All parents want to do is give their children the best they can, but somehow God gets hold of them and they go out to save the world! You never can tell what will happen once Jesus gets loose! We only want the best out of love for our children.....except God may have OTHER plans in mind!
I used to think that Jesus was mistaken when he said that there were people there who would not taste death until they saw the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. I was wrong. Following the Resurrection, the birth of the church at Pentecost had to have been witnessed by LOTS of folks who had heard Jesus's words. There were also Jews and Gentiles present who would be swept together into the young fellowship. And not only that: due to the efforts of the Apostle Paul and others, the good news of Jesus had spread across Asia Minor and even as far as Rome, the seat of the Empire. So, Jesus was right: there WERE people standing there who would not taste death until they saw his kingdom come with power. It may have come after the earthly life of Jesus, but come it did, and it is still here. Will it continue to exist? Perhaps that's up to you and me....and, of course, the God who raised Jesus from the dead. Amen.
Pastor Skip
