Kathleen Rushton discusses Jesus's reminder in Matthew 16:21-28 that discipleship means bearing the cross.

IN HIS GALILEE ministry, Jesus is interpreter, healer and reconciler on behalf of burdened humanity (Mt 4:12-10:42). Later, he encounters opposition (Mt 11:1-16:12). In Matthew 16:13-20 we see Jesus laying the ground for “my church.”

“My Church” Is an Alternative Society

When Peter proclaims Jesus as the Christ, his is a two-part confession: “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God” (Mt 16:16). The “Messiah” and the unique relationship which Jesus has with God, are held together. Australian biblical scholar Brendan Byrne says that Jesus is ensuring that ecclesiology (the Church) flows from and rests on a distinctive Christological insight.

The word “church” (ekklesia in Mt 16:18; 18:17) was used for the assembly of the people of God (Deut 9:10; Josh 8:35; 1 Kings 8:65). In Greek cities the ekklesia was a duly summoned civic and political assembly of citizens along with a council. Its role was to gather, administer and reinforce the status quo of the reign (basileia) of Rome. Jesus speaking of “my church” suggests an alternative community that under God’s guidance,
continues the reign of God in their time and place.

Formation of Disciples

A turning point occurs at this part of the Gospel: Jesus is not the Messiah the people were expecting. He moves from Galilee to focus on the formation of disciples who are “my church”. This new direction leads to Jerusalem which is under the control of religious and political elites.

Jesus says: “If anyone wants to be my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me“ (Mt 16:24). “Followers” means literally “to come after/behind me” — it’s a continuing way of being. Jesus is telling Peter that to become a follower is to keep learning what discipleship is all about.

Take Up the Cross

“To deny themselves” and “follow” is to “take up the cross.” (cf., Mt 10:38). Here, “cross” refers to how Jesus will be killed (Mt 16:21). His death and the way of discipleship are interconnected.

What does it mean for Jesus’s followers to “deny themselves”? “To deny” Jesus would be to choose not to follow him, not to “come after/behind” him, not to be faithful to God’s ways (Mt 10:33; 26:34-35, 75). It doesn't mean to be so intimidated by political and religious authorities and their power over life and death, that they renounce their commitment to Jesus and seek self-interest by siding with the authorities. Jesus's followers “deny ourselves” by turning from all that hinders faithfulness in entrusting themselves to God’s way. It is this self-denial and trust in God that led Jesus to suffering and death.

Over the centuries Christian religiosity has obscured the radical nature of Jesus’s invitation to take up “the cross”. In the Roman world crucifixion came with various forms of torture and humiliation, such as making victims carry their crossbeams to the public place of execution, being stripped naked and leaving the bodies for wild beasts and birds of prey.

Thinking about the Cross

Crucifixion is a harsh reality, and so the cross is no easy thing to “take up”. German historian Martin Hengel believed that reflecting on the brutal reality of the cross “may help us to overcome the acute loss of reality which is found so often in present theology and preaching.”

While we no longer crucify as a punishment (though the death penalty, and torture, are still very much in our world), humans as a species are crucifying peoples and planet Earth economically, socially, politically and environmentally.

We know from examining our own way of living, behaviour and pre-occupations that we do not love all human persons and Earth as completely as God calls us to. Our ignorance, indifference, preferences and actions are often self-absorbed, and we make excuses for our limitations.

A helpful prayer resource for us might be the Laudato Si’ Movement Prayer Book. The "Ecological Way of the Cross" in it helps relate the suffering of Christ’s Passion to the suffering of Earth and the poor in our own time.

Bearing Our Cross

The price of following Jesus in his alternative community, the church, is to encounter suffering because of our commitment. For some, like Martin Luther King, Oscar Romero and Irene McCormack, it meant the loss of life itself. It is what Paul calls the “folly of the cross” (Cor 1:23) -— a commitment to that which threatens our own life and yet gives it. We are not all martyrs, but we have our “cross” to bear and a community to support us.

We are called to “denial of self” — to follow Christ and stop the self-centredness of our “false self” from leading us into a competitive and exploitative way of life.

By denying our false selves we enable the interests of our true selves and our commitment to discipleship to flourish.

Death-Resurrection

In the New Testament Jesus’s suffering and death-resurrection are always connected. Our contemporary art can lead us to focus only on the suffering Jesus — as if that was the end. Indeed, Jesus on the cross is usually the principal image within
our churches.

But for the first fifteen centuries Christians did not depict Jesus as suffering on the cross. Their images were more like those found in the 6th-century mosaics in the chapel of St Apollinare in Ravenna: depictions of the risen Christ, or Jesus on a cross adorned with jewels.

Daniel O’Leary wrote Dancing to My Death when he was struggling with his cancer diagnosis. He wrestled — as Jesus did — with embracing a future which means pain, suffering and death. But in facing his condition with tough honesty O’Leary was able to understand how his suffering connected him — and all of us — into creation, incarnation and evolution. The Divine Creator became human in Jesus and entered with us into the love, joy and suffering of God’s unfinished, evolving universe.

“Sooner or later life is going to lead us into a place of pain we
cannot fix, control, explain or understand,” O’Leary wrote. But God desires “to live at the heart of our pain, to become in Jesus, the divine/human back to bear and carry our particular crosses.”

This is where transformation happens — of the Church as of individuals — “because only then,” O’Leary wrote, “are we finally in the hands of God.”

Tui Motu Magazine. Issue 284 August 2023: 24-35