JESUS, THE SERVANT OF YAHWEH

XXIV SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME - Mark 8:27-35

Whenever we meet someone for the first time, the question comes naturally: Who are you? When the answer is not enough, we go on asking: Where do you live? What do you do? And we expect an answer which will help us to know and understand the other person so that we can relate each other.

Surrounded by his disciples, Jesus inverted the question, asking them: “What do people say about me? Who do they say I am?” There is always a variety of opinions about those living among us and those opinions may distract us and lead us to the wrong conclusions. We may be easily carried away by the common opinion or the politically correct, which turns out to be very incorrect. Each one of us must find the truth for himself and form his own opinion. That’s why Jesus asked a direct question: “But you, who do you say I am?”

And Jesus’ question reverberates through the ages, reaching our own times. The opinions about Jesus are the most diverse. However, Jesus demands a personal answer to his question and so he goes on repeating it time and again: Who do you say I am?

Peter was quick with his answer: You are the Christ. And we learnt the same answer through the catechism. It is a quick and easy answer. And the whole Christian tradition tells us the same answer. It is part of our faith. We all know that Jesus is the Christ (Messiah), the Son of God, who came to save the world. However, what is the impact on our lives of this memorised quick and short answer?

We may be like Peter, who gave the right answer but had a very wrong understanding of that same answer. Peter represents the disciple who is committed, sincere and full of enthusiasm, while at the same time being delusional. He had very wrong ideas about the Messiah and from those ideas, he got very wrong expectations.  In spite of big crowds following him, Jesus was never a populist and never used deception to get or to keep the approval of the masses. He did not hide the difficulties which they would encounter in following him. Yes, he was the Messiah, but not a glorious, wealthy and powerful Messiah. Jesus presented himself as the Servant of Yahweh, announced by Isaiah, who accepted rejection, persecution and suffering for his people. He is the faithful servant, who has his life founded on the bedrock of God’s Word. In spite of facing suffering and death, he is “untouched by the insults”, keeping his trust in God, sure that he will “not be shamed” (Is 50:7).

Being the Servant of Yahweh, Jesus speaks openly of his impending death. However, that is beyond comprehension and Peter reacted immediately, trying to dissuade Jesus from such fateful outcome. Jesus’ answer to Peter’s intervention can be considered as shocking: “Get behind me, Satan! Because the way you think is not God’s way but man’s.” Peter is the obtuse disciple who thinks that he knows better than his master. His ideas of the Messiah are not different from the proposals the devil made to Jesus in the desert.

Jesus’ way of salvation passes through suffering and death and there is no way to avoid them. 

“If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross and follow me. For anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone who loses his life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it” (Mc 8:34-35).