The gospel reading for Sunday, September 3rd is Matthew 16:21-27. It tells the story of Jesus, who is still wrestling through things with Peter, discussing the suffering, death, and resurrection.
Matthew 16:21-27
From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, “Far be it form you, Lord! This shall never happen to you.” But he turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Stan! You are a hindrance to me. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”
Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul? For the Son of Man is going to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay each person according to what he has done.”
It helps to know
Matthew (16:21-23) is gentler with Peter than Mark is (8:31-33), but more specific. Mark says, “[Jesus] rebuked him.” Matthew says, “He said…” But Matthew has Jesus go on: “You are a stumbling block to me” (v. 23). This specific word recalls two moments earlier in Matthew:
First, “The Son of Man will send forth his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all stumbling blocks… and will throw them into the furnace of fire” (13:41-42). Peter is identified as a son of the kingdom at times, but Jesus identifies him, at this moment, as a son of the evil one. This mention of the Son, the angels, and the judgment at Ch. 13 anticipates today’s discussion of Son, angels, and judgment at 16:27.
Second, “On this rock, I will build my church” (16:18). Peter has gone from good rock to stumbling stone.
Not only has Peter demonstrated the behavior of a “weed” (cf. 13:41, where a “stumbling block” is a “weed”) sown by the devil (13:39)…
And not only has he echoed Satan’s “If it is you” (Peter, 14:28; cf. Satan, 4:6)…
But Matthew points out that, like Satan, Peter also tempts Jesus with gaining the world. Satan had offered Jesus the world (4:8). Once Jesus rebukes Peter, he helps his disciples to resist this temptation: “what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?” (16:26)
“Losing” your “life.” It’s an old idea, but it wasn’t supposed to be as serious as Jesus took it. The rabbis had promoted “losing one’s life” in a passage where Alexander the Great had come to question the Jewish elders:
[Alexander] said to them: What must a man do and thereby ensure that he will live? They said to him: Such a man must figuratively kill himself, by living moderately. Alexander further inquired: What must a man do and ensure that he will die? They said to him: Such a man must keep himself alive, i.e., lead an extravagant and indulgent life. (b. Tamid 32a)
Jesus appears to endorse this view: “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (16:27).
But he speak more frankly to the disciples than the rabbis spoke to Alexander: He must “go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised” (16:21). Had Jesus simply echoed the rabbis’ endorsement of moderation, which Alexander would certainly already have learned from Aristotle, Peter would have kept his words to himself.
The repeated “behind me” phrase. Jesus tells Satan, “Hupage, Satana” (literally, “Get, Satan,” 4:10). “Get”, as in “Go on an’ git!”
Jesus tells Peter, “Hupage hopiso mou, Satana” (“Get behind me, Satan,” 16:23). Same word, plus a direction. Repetition, with an addition. I think this is where the grace is. The phrase “Behind me,” is repeated and framed as discipleship out in the following verses: “If anyone would come after me (hopiso mou), let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me” (16:24).
This is a place where I wish the ESV had preserved Matthew’s Greek repetition and not hidden the pattern:
Jesus says to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan.”
Jesus says to all disciples, “If anyone wishes to come behind me…”
In short, “Get” is a rebuke word for Satan and Peter. “Behind me” is a good place for Peter and all disciples.
Sure, “come behind me” sounds nicer than “get behind me,” but, as in real estate, it’s all about Location, Location, Location. Even if Peter hadn’t been told, “Get behind me, Satan,” he would have had to have been told, “Get behind me, Peter.” That should preach.
Lectionary Resonances
Jeremiah 15:15-21. The focus is on speaking rightly: “If you utter what is precious, and not what it worthless, you shall be as my mouth. They shall turn to you, but you shall not turn to them” (v. 19). God will make such a speaker a “fortified wall of bronze,” so that the people “shall not prevail over you” (v. 20). This text develops Peter’s call from ch. 16: to speak precious words of discipleship against which the gates of hell shall not prevail.
Psalm 26. Curiously, this is a psalm of individuality. Lots of “me” and “I” language. The only talk of others is talk of bad-others, e.g., “I do not sit with men of falsehood, nor do I consort with hypocrites” (v. 4). If I’m Peter reading this, I want to affirm Jesus’ individuality and do everything in my power not to be the man of falsehood who would trip him up. Today’s gospel shows that Jesus doesn’t need Peter. He says, “If anyone would come [behind] me,” not “If anyone would join me,” or “walk beside me.” (Let the reader provide her own nuance.)
Romans 12:1-8. Paul’s “present your bodies as a living sacrifice” (v. 1) is the apostolic corollary to the dominical, “take up his cross.” But there’s more. Paul has in view “the renewal of your mind, that… you may discern what is the will of God” (v. 2), the way Jesus has said, “you are not setting your mind on the things of God.”
How I might preach this
This could go in any of a number of ways:
Focus on the unique mind and will of Jesus, whose mind is more fully set on the will of God than anyone. This pairs with an exhortation to choose following Jesus (Matt. 16) over stumbling over worldly advice from friends (Ps. 26), to learn to speak like Jesus (Jer. 15), and to think like Jesus (Rom. 12).
Continue to follow Peter’s story. Reflect on the ways in which the Church speaks both precious words and useless ones (Matt. 16; Rom. 12). The voice of Jesus both rebukes and us and calls us to discipleship.
Doing theology of death. Jesus is not endorsing moderation (b. Tamid 32a), but describing real, literal death (Matt. 16). This triggers Peter, but Paul backs Jesys up on it in Romans: We participate in his death (Rom. 6), and we continue to offer ourselves as sacrifices (Rom. 12).