God Calls Us to Our Mission: As Jesus prepares to begin His final journey to Jerusalem, He instructs His disciples what this will entail. Not the triumphant crowning of a new King that some of them are expecting. Instead, Jesus will encounter great suffering and death at the hands of His enemies. Peter, in his newly bestowed role as leader of the apostles and consistent with his impetuous nature, rushes in to ‘improve’ Jesus’s plan. “God forbid, Lord! No such thing shall ever happen to you.” (Matthew 16:22) We are all familiar with Jesus’s rebuke to the hapless Peter.
God constantly calls and instructs us throughout our lives. He provides us with gifts and an invitation to use these gifts to expand the fullness of our lives and the lives of those around us. And who doesn’t like gifts, right? However, it is inevitable in a fallen world and with our imperfect natures that sometimes the gifts from God involve suffering. Like Peter, we would prefer to take our gifts without suffering.
Christ’s Mission
Every human is mortally bound to die. Jesus’s human death was intimately and mysteriously tied to His earthly mission of sacrifice for the redemption of our sin. “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:45)
Jesus perfectly embodies the will of His Father. Thus, He is able to provide us with the perfect example of fidelity to His God-given mission. Jesus is fully aware of the profound suffering this requires: “Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say – ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour.” (John 12:27) and “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not what I want but what you want.” (Matthew 26:39)
Jesus shoulders His cross. He overcomes His natural human fear of suffering and accepts God’s mission for Him.
The Strength to Bear Our Crosses
Jesus tells us that we also must deny ourselves and take up our own crosses. “For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 16:26) This is a hard message. Our nature rebels against such surrender of ourselves. For many people, acceptance of the mystery of human suffering is their greatest stumbling block to belief in an all-loving God.
Our faith tells us that we will experience perfect joy for eternity when we are in heaven with God. But how do we cope with suffering, ours and others, when we are here on earth?
Fortunately, the strength to accept the pain of this life as a necessary prelude for our growth into union with God does not depend on us alone. Father d’Elbee says, “…do not fear any cross because I know that when a cross comes, [Jesus] always comes too.” As St. Therese tells us, “All you permit for me will be grace from you, and you will be there with me. I do not fear the cross because I do not fear you, the King of Love.”
[Readings: Jeremiah 20:7-9; Romans 12:1-2; Matthew 16:21-27]
