If anyone wishes to
follow me, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever would save their life will lose
it; and whoever loses their life for my sake will save it. [Mark 8:34-35; Matthew 16:24-25; Luke
9:23-24; John 12:25]
Now we come to the crux of it, I think. What we have from Jesus is another way of
living – “Losing” my life, as the gospel writer expresses it, rather than
“saving” my life… I want to say, after a week of pondering this,
and at the risk of everyone falling about laughing, that what Jesus does for
his followers is readjust our relationship with the possessive personal
pronoun. My life… my lifestyle…
my possessions… my feelings… my rights… my opinions… my faith… my church… my
dreams… my goals… my safety… my… oh my.
Obviously we use the possessive pronouns in all sorts of ways, some of which
are perfectly fine. But in Jesus’s
company we start to see that my needs and preferences are not the point.
As Paul says to the Church at
Corinth: What do you have that you did not receive? And if you received it, why do you boast as
if it were not a gift? [I Cor 4:7]. By saving my life, as Jesus uses the word, we mean
possessiveness and ownership, as though we have forgotten is that all is gift,
not only our possessions, but our very breath, our neurones, our next
heartbeat, our ability to love, and the sparkle on the water of Kawau Bay. By “saving” my life he means me first, my
safety and security, defending what I believe is mine. So it goes with my inability to let go… not
only of possessions, but also of opinions and beliefs, of attitudes, of poisonous
memories. Saving is clinging.
Losing my life is the discovery, in Jesus’s company, that I
don’t need to take myself all that seriously.
It is a developing inner freedom.
It is a growing willingness to relinquish control, to loosen my grip on
people and events. I find one day I can
more easily be happy for people to be themselves, for better or for worse. My life and my wishes and preferences
may be interesting, but never for me definitive or determinative, or even all
that important, any more.
We learn now to live with mystery and unanswered
questions. A man in a Christian study
group recently announced, evidently without blinking, I have no problems with the Holy Trinity. Perhaps there is no mystery in his life
at all. Perhaps he is, as the
politicians like to say, substantially satisfied with the main issues. In the Beatitudes, Jesus blesses the meek, he
blesses those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, as though they haven’t
found it yet, he blesses the merciful, the pure in heart, and the
peacemakers. It brings us to the borders
of contemplative life and prayer, where what we do is follow Jesus, not knowing
where the road ends, but knowing that he follows us, day by day.
The contemplative people I know tend to be normally busy and
involved people. Some are very busy
indeed, on all manner of worthy things.
Others who are not able to do much, keep a daily interest in what is
happening to others around the world.
What we all have in common is the fellowship of silence and stillness,
the place of empty hands and minds quietly paying attention, where Jesus is
present. Our facades are being dismantled
and all our chatter is ceasing. We have
nothing to prove and nothing to achieve.
St Paul says: You have died, and
your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed
with him in glory [Colossians 3:3-4].
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