i Don’t Do Death

February 28, 2021

Psalm 22:23-31
Mark 8:31-9:8

This past month, a few staff and volunteers attended a training on how to minister to grieving people. The instructor told the story about a man whose wife had died. When the instructor went to visit the man, the man was shocked to see him and asked why he was there. The instructor said that he was concerned about him because his wife died, and wondered if he needed someone to talk to. The man simply said, “Oh, I don’t need you. I don’t do death.”

I don’t do death. The statement is loaded with denial and fear. No one wants to think about death—especially their own or a loved one’s. And I think this is partly what fuels Peter’s response to Jesus’ recognition of the path he would be taking. “The Son of Man will suffer, be rejected by the religious leaders, and killed.” At least, that’s all that Peter heard. He missed the part about being raised three days later. He couldn’t see past the horrible future Jesus laid before him. And quite frankly, that’s not what he signed on for. He wasn’t in it for death. He was in it for victory.

Death and failure, as I’ve often mentioned, was NOT what people expected of the long-awaited Messiah. And this, at least, Peter got right. Just prior to our passage, Jesus and the disciples had stood before the pagan temple at Caesarea Philippi—a town named for human kings and a location dedicated to false gods. And here, Jesus asked the disciples what they had been hearing about him. Some were saying Elijah, or another Prophet, or John the Baptist returned from the dead. Jesus asked them what they’d been saying about him, and Peter excitedly piped up: “You’re the Messiah, the Christ, the promised one of old who has come to free us from oppression!”

And Jesus told him to stop talking. Then, he taught them what the Son of Man—a particular understanding of the Messiah—was really about. He would suffer, be rejected, and die at the hands of the very people he was expected to destroy. The Son of Man was meant to lose.

Imagine what that must have felt like for the disciples. They had backed him—emotionally and financially. They had traveled with him, ministered with him, heard him preach, watched him heal. It was clear that he was the one the prophets had promised. But it was like he was rejecting his whole purpose. The disappointment and fear that must have rolled off of them would have been palpable. “No, Jesus. We don’t do death. We do victory. Let’s start over.”

Which is, basically, what Peter probably said to him.

It occurred to me only recently why every Lent begins with the story of Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness. Every year, we hear that just after his baptism, the spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan. Only after that does he begin his ministry in Galilee. I think it’s not so much about being tempted but being tested—same word in Greek. If Jesus can get through that, he will be ready for the various temptations that come his way in the stories we hear throughout the rest of Lent.

Today, he is tempted to take up the mantel of the kind of Messiah the people expected. He could have. He could have wielded a sword, stirred the crowds into an army, and marched against Rome, against Herod, and against those who had turned the religious life into a life of obligation and misery. He could have literally freed the people from oppression. And he would have won. He would have reigned over the people and brought peace to the land.

Two things are wrong with this picture. He would have only become savior to his own people and no one else. And as long as he held the sword, people would worship him in fear rather than love. Because you can’t claim worldly power AND save the world at the same time.

So, he told Peter, the tempter, to get behind him. Fall in line. Support him. Follow him. Because he knew the truth of his life and death—that it wouldn’t end on a cross. But he also knew that the disciples would have to see that for themselves.

They would need to see that death isn’t the enemy—that injustice, lies, and ill-gotten power are worse than death. Jesus would enter death so that he could show them true life. Not a life won in battle but a life given in love. Because, as long as you ‘don’t do death,’ you don’t really do life, either.

This is what Peter missed in Jesus’ declaration of his purpose. That he would rise again. He missed it because he was too busy formulating his response to the idea that the Messiah would be destined to die. How often do we miss God’s promise because we become so caught up in our own fears and worries? How many times do we stop listening to God’s voice of hope because we are working out our response to the challenges before us?

How often do we miss Jesus’ true mission because we get caught up over how that mission is going to happen? His mission wasn’t to die. His mission is to give life—abundant, full, vibrant life. But he also knows how people in power respond when life is shared with the multitude. He knows how violent opposition can become when someone comes along to shift to status quo. His talk of death wasn’t about his mission but about the very real and inevitable response he would receive to his acts of love. Sometimes, people just don’t want love if it means losing what they have—power, prestige, privilege.

And Jesus goes on to warn the crowd that anyone who follows him—who loves like he loves and lives like he lives—will be met with the same fate. This is what it means to take up your cross and follow. I think a better phrasing would have been for Jesus to say, “Take up MY cross and follow me.” Because it’s not suffering for suffering’s sake that is a reflection of faith. But when we suffer because we love and live and care and challenge the way Jesus did—that’s the cross that leads to life. That’s the cross that is evidence of a faith in the God of life.

We can’t just ‘not do death.’ As Christians, we have already died. In baptism, we are buried with Christ and raised to new life. We are commissioned to walk behind him, to follow him, to emulate him, to love with Christ-like love—which means that we don’t get to choose who receives this love. Everyone is worthy. Because Christ chose life for the whole world over victory for a nation. Christ ‘did death’ so that all might live.

Will we hear his words that call us to life and hope and justice? Or will we get caught up in the things he calls us to die to? Dying to rights so that we live to responsibility; dying to power so that we live to grace; dying to hate so that we live to love. These are the ways of Christ—the cross he bears. These are what got him killed. And these are what give us life. Will we listen to the promise that he shouts from the cross? Or will we try to find a middle ground so that we don’t quite have to die—and therefore, we never truly live?

Today, we extended the gospel reading to include Jesus’ transfiguration. On the mountaintop, Peter, again, lets his words and thoughts get him all tripped up and muddled. And from the clouds, God finally shuts him up by saying, “This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!” Stop talking. Stop trying to defend yourself or your ideas. Listen. In Jesus, you will hear hope. In Jesus, you will hear peace. In Jesus, you will hear justice. In Jesus, you will hear life. We need not justify why we keep denying death. We need only to stop talking for a moment to hear the Word of God spoken—from the mountaintop, from the cross, and from an empty tomb.

Pastor Tobi White
Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church
Lincoln, NE