Facing Our Mirages*

24th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Proper 19

Mark 8:27-35
(click for Gospel Text)
Homily given at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church, New Harmony, Indiana
September 13, 2015
click here for part 1
and here for part 2
and again here for part 3
(long story;)

Peter, in today’s gospel has his VISION focused on a MIRAGE

30 years ago I heard a homily that I still remember

Fr. Lou Guntzelman began with a question 
a small boy asked his mother

Mom…What is the difference 
between a MIRAGE and a MARRIAGE?

This led me to take an informal survey

I’ve asked a number of folks

“What comes to mind when you hear the word MIRAGE?”

And other than the one person 
who envisioned a hotel on the Las Vegas strip

It was pretty well universal

Something that isn’t real…
and then a visual component of an oasis in the desert

For me it was a scene from an old western movie

With the half dead horse carrying a half dead cowboy

The half dead cowboy with parched cracked lips 
is reaching for the pool of water

…reaching for something that isn’t real

Peter, in today’s gospel has his VISION focused on a MIRAGE

Our Gospel reading today is from Chapter 8 of Mark’s Gospel

We are in the middle of the Gospel and it is THE turning point

A kind of hinge…

Everything before this…

Has Jesus reaching out

teaching, healing and casting out demons

A Jesus reaching out to Jews and Gentiles

To Sinners and the Righteous

…and he’s been about this work during the week and on the Sabbath.

The result has been a brewing

A large crowd of fascinated followers has been brewing

And a powerful bunch of provoked leaders has also been brewing

That’s what has come before

And what follows in the latter chapters

is Jesus with his attention focused on his

small band of hand-picked disciples

Jesus knows he needs to prepare them

For what will unfold

Jesus isn’t trying for perfect

He is just hoping for enough understanding

…Enough clarity of vision

So that when suffering and death come

They will have eyes, and ears, and hearts open to perceive the resurrection.

But in today’s passage

It is “mid-semester”

It is time to assess the students

The easy question first…Who do THEY...

Then the hard question…Who do YOU say that I am?

I can sense a long ……… silence

Nobody wants to raise a hand

finally PETER

It has to be Peter…the spokesperson…the rock

YOU.    ARE.    THE.    MESSIAH.

Peter did get the right Word anyway.

Jesus begins phase 2 teaching

He needs to broaden the meaning of Messiah

It needs to include “the suffering Son of Man”

Peter’s meaning, the meaning of the day, is a MIRAGE

A Messiah that comes in and reverses the political order of the day…that rights all the wrongs and injustices…by any number of means…just like that!

No…that’s not Jesus---the Christ---the Son of Man---

No…That’s a MIRAGE

Peter is clenching his MIRAGE…

He’s not ready to let go quite yet

He steps into the teacher role…

            “Jesus, I think you’ve got it all wrong…”

Bad idea!

GET.    BEHIND.        ME.       SATAN.

Tough, tough, tough language…

Thirty years ago the very pastoral Fr. Lou Guntzelman wasn’t that harsh

But the essence of the message was the same

Cindy and Rob, 
your heads are full of a MIRAGE

I know

I know because every young couple I’ve ever counseled 
has had the same problem

And it’s okay

Today is not about perfection

It is about beginning a walk...

an unfolding walk from MIRAGE to MARRIAGE

And it WILL involve some suffering, and death, and resurrection too

(Just to come clean…I didn’t remember anything but the cute story about the boy)

Isn’t  Peter’s problem the same thing?

Isn’t his vision, likewise stuck on a MIRAGE???

And doesn’t this happen in our life of discipleship?

Don’t we get stuck on mirages from time to time?

I think that’s what the latter part of today’s passage is about

All the talk about saving and losing

We clench what we want to save

What we are afraid to lose

And we can’t unfold with our hands all clenched

It’s a mirage

We know that …We know that it doesn’t work that way

But it is so so easy to forget

It began at our baptism

…this walk of discipleship

But its never over

I think that’s why we come here

Why Christian communities bother to gather at all

Because we need nourishment and companionship

The Good News is that discipleship is not about being perfect

And the challenge is that we are always going to wrestle with the tough question

But we are never alone

Especially here

Where the church gathers

And Christ is present

In Word, Sacrament, and Neighbor

Where fresh faith…fresher faith

Is just a half a pew away

And that is just very good news.