Twenty-second Sunday In Ordinary Time
MATTHEW 16:21-27 (Jeremiah 20:7-9; Romans 12:1-2)
Matthew is guided by the Gospel of Mark in a remarkable contrast between the glory of last Sunday’s gospel reading and the gospel of this Sunday. Last Sunday we experienced Simon’s grand profession of faith in Jesus as “Son of the living God.” Attached to that profession we saw Jesus’ response – that Simon spoke thus not on his own, but because he received this knowledge about Jesus directly from the Father in heaven. The grandeur of Simon’s divinely inspired words was rewarded by the grandeur of Jesus’ response. Simon will from that time on bear the title of “Rock” and foundation of the community Jesus would establish, the Church.
Jesus’ dramatic response continues with the bestowal of “the keys of the kingdom of heaven” on Simon Peter, Simon the Rock. The empowering of Peter as Rock and bestowal of “the keys” occurs only in Matthew’s gospel. After this scene, Matthew again takes up Mark’s version. The grandeur of the preceding scene is now balanced by the tragedy of Jesus’ prediction of his suffering and death in Jerusalem. Suffering and death was not welcome news to Simon Peter, and he does not seem to have even heard what was to come after Jesus’ suffering and death, “and on the third day be resurrected.” Simon Peter’s recent empowerment makes this successful businessman even bolder. He takes Jesus aside and rebukes him, “No way, Lord! This shall never happen to you!"
Bad, bad move, Simon! The recently featured Rock is about to be crushed. The impression is given that Jesus was walking boldly ahead of his disciples as he directed his steps to Jerusalem to meet his fate. The disciples were following closely behind him. Simon Peter seems to have stepped out of line, taken Jesus by the arm and rebuked him. Thus Jesus’ fierce rejection of Simon’s refusal to accept the concept of suffering and death,
“Go behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance (scandal) to me, for you are not on the side of God but of men.”
Matthew’s version of the triple temptation of Jesus has raised its ugly head as Matthew equates Simon’s temptation of Jesus with that of the Great Tempter. Matthew’s Greek expression, hupage (Go!), is exactly the same as Jesus’ reply to Satan in the temptation scene, Matthew 4:10. Matthew adds (from Mark’s gospel) “behind me,” to indicate the proper place for a disciple of Jesus, even the disciple who becomes Jesus’ representative on earth. Jesus is always first, always leading those behind him, no matter what their title or function may be in the building which Jesus called “my Church.” Matthew, author of the catechism which we call the Gospel of Matthew, decided that further clarification is needed to properly instruct his Christian Community about suffering, death, resurrection.
Mark’s gospel disconnects the following sayings from the foregoing episode of Simon Peter being put back in line. In Mark, Jesus addresses the multitude. Matthew rightly sees that Jesus’ immediate disciples needed further instruction in this matter. The term disci-ples, in Matthew’s version, at least in this instance, refers to the Twelve following him en route to Jerusalem. They represent the leaders of the Church, who, only fifty years after Jesus’ departure, were already assuming too much grandeur and self-importance. This is clear from Matthew 23:8-11. There Jesus reminds them that “the greatest among you shall be your slave,” and “whoever exalts himself will be humbled,” like Jesus had to humble Simon Peter. Therefore Matthew begins, “Then Jesus said to his disciples….”
By extension Matthew’s instruction applies also to every Christian, just as it did original-ly in the Gospel of Mark.
“If anyone wishes to come along behind me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” Thus the cross awaiting Jesus in Jerusalem is an experience that could be shared first of all by the leaders (slaves, servants) in the Christian Community, then by all Christians. When Matthew composed his gospel in the eighties of the first century, taking up the cross could mean literally being crucified, as sometimes happened to Christian martyrs in the first century. Tradition based on John 21:18-19 assigns this kind of martyr-dom (crucifixion) to Simon Peter himself. By extension, the “cross” includes every other kind of martyrdom.
Luke 9:23 extends the meaning of “the cross” to the daily vexations that any and all Christians might experience in their daily lives, “If any man wishes to come along behind me, let him…take up his cross daily and follow me.” This is our usual understanding of “the cross” today, although Christians even in our time are being killed for being Christians. The next saying is a confusing type of reversal-statement, “Whoever would save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will gain it.” Christians who reject the cross “to preserve their life” in this world, will lose it. Does this mean that we should seek the cross, seek suffering? No way! Jesus himself begged to escape the cross just as we can use every medical means to escape suffering and death. But in the end we are expected to yield to the inescapable and say with Jesus, “Not mine but thy will be done.”
