2nd Sunday of Lent
By Reverend Canon Barry Rose, Sunday 8th March, 2009
This week we found ourselves visiting the Theatre Museum at Christiansborg. We were the only visitors at the time so when the lady at the ticket desk asked us to fill in an appraisal form in exchange for two free cups of coffee we readily agreed. One question was about their café and to be honest we did not know what to say as the variety of items for sale was limited. I said as gently as I could that it might be an idea to display a notice at the entrance that there was a café in the museum. Puzzled she said there was. So when we left I looked and sure enough there was a very small sign simply saying CAFÉ. I had not seen it. That is typical for me as home I am always saying “Have you seen my wallet, my comb and so on.
Throughout chapter 8 of St Mark’s Gospel Jesus is saying to his disciples “Do you not see.” St Mark has woven together sayings and stories about Jesus all about blindness and sight. Let’s have a quick excursion into the text?
The chapter begins with the feeding of the 4000. Jesus and his disciples then escape the crowds by getting into a boat at which point the disciples, just like your normal man, discover they have not brought enough to eat. Jesus says to them “Do you still not understand? You have eyes – can you not see? Through me 5,000 and then 4,000 people were fed.” Something here about the blind disciples?
There follows the story of the healing of the blind man in two stages. Jesus lays his hands on him and asks, “Can you see anything?” The man answers “I see trees as men walking” Only partial sight has been given. Jesus lays his hands again on the man and he sees clearly. Something here about the disciples slowly beginning to see?
Then a climax in the gospel story for Jesus wants the disciples to know if they have seen who he really is. The use of two questions is subtle because once again sight is given in stages. “Who do men say that I am?” Jesus asks. That’s easy enough to answer – just passing on what other people think. But then the bombshell question, “Who do you say that I am?” From the silence and in a flash of inspiration Peter blurts out “Oh I now see. You are the one Messiah, the one for which we Jews have waited for so long – the one sent to us by God – the Christ – the deliverer.” Ah, at last blindness is going but not yet fully. At which point we come to today’s Gospel.
At the time of Jesus the Jewish people were really expecting God to intervene in their plight and free them from Roman domination. As God had helped them in the past he was going to act again. Jesus strides on to this scene of bubbling expectation. Peter is the first to see that in Jesus God is acting, is intervening but he has to learn that his first expectations about Jesus are wrong. Jesus reveals that he, the Messiah, must undergo great suffering and be rejected. What an impossible concept for him to accept. For him God’s Messiah would not suffer but would be welcomed by all the people who would sing and rejoice and lay down palms in the street as he rode into Jerusalem on a donkey. ‘Hosanna to the King of Kings’ is what will be sung to him for after all this was the one for which they had longed for so many years. Peter verbalises all these hopes and dreams. “You’ve got it wrong, master.” he says, “You, as Messiah, are supposed to rule, not suffer, to have acclaim not rejection. You’ve got to be an expression of our longing, a projection of our needs.” Peter is still partially sighted. He has not grasped that Jesus is not just another man from the tired old past. In the words of Tom Wright in his commentary on Mark Peter had not yet penetrated to the secret at the heart of Israel’s vocation: that Israel’s God, the world’s creator, took delight in acting in this topsy-turvy fashion, precisely to redeem a topsy-turvy world. But for Peter and the disciples there is more.
Not only will the long awaited Messiah suffer and die but also his disciples are to follow him. “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up the cross and follow me.” Not exactly what Peter wanted to hear. Perhaps this is why immediately after this Jesus takes him with James and John up the mountain to experience the divine presence in the cloud and be reassured God His Father was with him. For a while on the mountain Peter was removed from the thought of the cross and wanted to stay on the mountain. Jesus will have none of that and down they come into the valley where a dumb boy, who is healed, awaits them. Something here about seeing before speaking?
The challenge for us, not only in Lent, but throughout our lives as we try and follow Jesus and travel the way he goes, is to stop working for our own good and be less self centred. The trouble is we want to avoid the painful parts of the passion and leapfrog over Palm Sunday and Good Friday to the triumphant shouts at Easter. Much more acceptable to us and modern man.
So here is a quotation from the Lent book by Timothy Radcliffe. “After Peter’s profession of faith the honeymoon is over. His friendship with Jesus must now pass through a testing time. He will fail miserably but all this will form him as a man whose faith must flower into hope and eventually into mature love.” That’s comforting for us as we stumble to follow Jesus and the way of the cross, as are some wise words by your former chaplain, “Humanity is not perfect. God used humanity not perfection”. If you are like me you struggle to see, believe and accept this as you look for the keys or the credit card.
