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]
I think this is the heart of discipleship. I would like to spend a week or two around
this theme, Losing and Finding. And I
think it’s as well to note at the start that we find this teaching from Jesus
in all four gospels. It is really beyond
doubt an authentic record, the more so that the gospels are in remarkable
agreement about precisely what he said.
Secondly, what Jesus teaches here is for everyone. It is not some private special teaching for
his immediate disciples. In Mark, the
earliest written gospel, we read: He
called to him the multitude, with his disciples, and said to them… In Luke, simply: He said to all…
There are two big problems, it seems to me. The first is – and we will come back to this
repeatedly, I think – that we do not wish to deny ourselves. I may choose to deny myself excess sugar, or
cream… but it is still my choice. However,
none of that is what Jesus means.
Denying self is something altogether deeper and more meaningful than
what we might call self-denial. Even
that, now, in our secular, idolatrous culture, is considered silly and
unnecessary. No one is going to stop me
having what I want. That is the first
problem. What Jesus asks of us is deeply
counter-cultural and counter-intuitive.
The second problem is that Jesus in his day had never heard
the terms which we will need in order to understand this truth. He had never heard about the Ego or its role
in our lives. He had never heard of
psychology or its insights. What he was,
was wise – he saw into reality to where the blockages are. Out of his wisdom – and I would say, out of
his bond with God -- came this teaching, to all.
What then is the self I am invited to deny? In our day we label it the Ego. It is the self I present to the world – and,
often as not, I am convinced by it myself.
My persona… One teacher, Thomas
Keating, says the Ego is the accumulation of all our strategies to be happy,
successful, appreciated, safe… all that.
Laurence Freeman says it is the desire to dominate, the desire to take
rather than to give or simply to let be; it is the desire to possess… It is a lot more also. The Ego is good and necessary in many
ways. It is our instinctive protection,
it includes our genuine desire to be good and useful.
Contemplative understanding is that God dwells, abides, recognises
us, somehow behind and beyond this ego.
Steadily, over time, the ego yields place to God. It is a subtle and lovely process, and (I
think) impossible to describe, let alone define. But as we are still, asking for nothing,
simply consenting to God, the ego becomes more and more attenuated. We cease to take ourselves so seriously. What is good in the ego is confirmed and
reinforced, but even then we sense if once again it is assuming the place that
belongs to God.
We will continue this, I think, for two or three weeks,
exploring how we might say in our language and concepts, what Jesus taught in
his day to the multitude.
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