A hospice chaplain says: "In our hospice, we explain that as one nears death, the boundary between this life and the next becomes thinner, more permeable... We have had our patients report lots of visits. Several have reported visits from Jesus or family members.
What happened to Moses, to Elijah, and to Peter, James, and John happens to us as well. I don’t mean the burning bush or the silence or the mountaintop transfiguration. What I mean is the pattern which is apparent in each of these incidents.
I hope I am not ashamed of the Gospel—even if others do not always approve of me. I hope I am not ashamed of Jesus. I hope he is not ashamed of me. Amen.
Bonhoeffer would have us know that grace is free, but it's anything but cheap. It comes at the price of God's only Son, and it leads us to surrender our lives to God in gratitude. Bonhoeffer calls this, "costly grace."
Perhaps you have seen the bumper sticker paraphrasing the "Friends Don't Let Friends Drive Drunk" campaign. This one reads, "Friends Don't Let Friends Die Without Jesus." I would rather it read "Friends Don't Let Friends LIVE Without Jesus."
Take Jesus’ announcement that he must suffer, be rejected, be killed, and rise on the third day. We know that’s part of the story, but it’s painful to hear. Suffering, rejection, crucifixion, death. I think I’ll hold out for the Easter parade. That was Peter’s thinking too.
The question in the gospel is aimed not just at Peter, but all of us. Let me offer my own answer to the question asked by Jesus, "Who do you say I am?" I declare that Jesus is king. He is king of all, but in particular he is my king.
Jesus offered his disciples a three-fold standard for leadership. “If you are going to be leaders” Jesus tells them, “then you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow.” It seemed all too backwards to them.
This morning as we listen once more to this familiar passage from Mark's gospel, I invite you to put yourself in the story and ask, "What is my relationship to Jesus Christ?"
We may not have widespread famine or devastating drought or epidemic rates of TB . . . but make no mistake, we're poor in ways we were never poor when we lived crammed like sardines into five story walk-ups on the Lower East Side.