St George's Cathedral, Cape Town

A Sermon preached by the Reverend Bruce W. B. Jenneker in the Cathedral Church of St George the Martyr, Cape Town, on 29 March 2009

It had been a heady time for the disciples. They were finding g themselves bound to Jesus more and more each day. His message was radical, overturning taboos and challenging prejudices. Jesus taught that to obey the letter of the ritual laws and yet not be aligned with the spirit of the Covenant was hypocritical and unacceptable to God. 'You honour me with you lips,' Jesus quoted to them, 'but your hearts are far from me.' This young rabbi, who had called them from their boats on the lakeside, had new words, words full of life and possibility. They were captivated, inspired, committed.

Something wonderful was happening. A new order was breaking in. Not only was Jesus preaching about a new way of living that was drawing hundreds and hundreds of people, Jesus was also working the most amazing miracles.

In the space of a few weeks he had miraculously fed 5000 people when the disciples could only find five loaves and two fish. That evening he came to them while they were out on the lake: they, tossed about by turbulent waves; he, calmly walking on the water and bringing the stillness with him to the boat and to the lake. Incredible. Then, he moved into Gentile territory – which was an astonishing thing for a pious Jew to do. There he encountered a Syrophoenician woman – which was even more outrageous – and healed her daughter. Next he healed a deaf-mute and then fed another vast crowd of people, this time 4000, with just seven loaves and a few small fish. Then as they came to Bethsaida some people brought a blind man to Jesus so that Jesus could heal him. Jesus touched him and his sight was restored.

This was indeed a heady time for the disciples. Jesus seemed truly to be the messenger of God, the agent of God's will in their midst. Things were on the cusp, A new age was breaking in. The people saw it, and recognised it for the marvellous thing it was. This Rabbi of Nazareth was no ordinary mortal, this preacher was no rabble-rouser, this healer was no nine-day-wonder – this Jesus was something else all together.

The disciples were talking about this astonishing thing of which they were a part, with Jesus sitting alone, a little way off, quite still, composed and serene, when he turned to them and said, 'Who do people say that I am?' 'You are the Messiah, the Christ,' Peter confessed, saying more than he understood.

And what was their Lord's response to this recognition and avowal? 'Tell no one this,' he sternly ordered them, and began to teach them that he had to undergo great suffering, be rejected and killed. Confused and bewildered, the disciples looked at one another in amazement. Is this how it will end? All this show of new life, and power, and this talk of the kingdom of God, all of this to end in death? And this crazy talk of rising again, on the third day, what is that about – just a red herring?

Devastated they were by all this talk of denying self, taking up crosses and losing life; it didn't add up, it didn't make sense. It was all futility and quite pointless. Was this the end of the road?

And still Jesus talked on and on about suffering and dying, and about this death meaning something, making a difference. And still it did not make sense to them.

Almost in spite of themselves, with gentle words that held them and an irresistible compassion that drew them, Jesus gave them glimpses of the life he was inviting them to choose, the way he was calling them to walk.

No simple political coup this, or an easy overturning of the way things had always been. What he was talking about was a whole new way of being alive, and to live this way meant to die to every other way. Dying and living were part of the same project he told them, so were losing and finding. If you want the life of freedom, everything that is unfree in you must die. If you want the life of holiness, everything that is irreverent in you must die. If you want to be full of joy, everything in you that is tempted by despair and seduced by negativity must die. If you want peace, every warring part of you must be stilled.

What this Rabbi of Nazareth was preaching was way beyond radical. He wasn't taking about fixing a situation, repairing a social system, reforming a society. What Jesus is on about is nothing less than the transformation of humanity. This is an enormous project. An impossible dream. The only was it could possibly occur is that one of us - someone like us in every way except in our predisposition to give up, give out, give in – someone like us had to achieve this transformation in his own life. Lay it down to save it. Lose it to gain it. Count it of little worth to find its inestimable value.

It is not easy for me to choose this path – even with our Lord beckoning, inviting me to tread where he has trod. I suspect that it is not easy for you as well. In the short term we have so much to lose. To give up all this control, to give up all this self-esteem, to give up all this regard, this comfort, this love of money, this security. To lose so much is real death, annihilation really.

And yet, not to take this road, shoulder this cross and follow this Lord is to abandon ourselves and our world to the tyranny of death. Only by challenging the power of control and domination can freedom be restored. Only by surrendering self-absorption can authentic personhood be realized. Only by abandoning self-righteousness and complacency can true generosity of spirit flourish.

Ours is a selfish world, short-sighted and driven by the egocentric desire to be the best, to have the most, and to win. Overturning this is the work Jesus is seeking to do. Overturning, your life and mine, and thereby turning around our world that has lost its balance and its gravity. Corruption and crime are rife among us, on our streets and the rumours of it in high places refuse to be stilled. Bringing our world of politics and government, finance and welfare into alignment with the dream of God – this is the work Jesus continues to do.

Can we take up this ministry of death – dying in ourselves, dying in our communities and in our nation – and doom to death all that threatens to diminish and destroy what is most human and most authentic about our humanity? Can we say no to drugs and bribes and complicity with what's just a little illegal and a little untrue? Can we reject what is unjust and life-denying, and stand up to be counted for that denunciation? Can we in the run-up to an election look at our society and stare down what makes for death and destruction?

'Keep politics out of sport,' we have been told by high officials in these last days. These words sound ominously familiar. The Dalai Lama has been refused a visa which would allow him to honour an invitation from the most respected person in our nation. This action is a frightening echo from a cruel history we thought we had left behind and begun to heal. Can we take up this ministry of death – dying in ourselves, dying in our communities and in our nation – and doom to death all that threatens to diminish and destroy what is most human and most authentic about our humanity?

It is easy, it appears on reflection, to follow Jesus in the midst of the applauding crowd, the wonder-struck throng, than to take up his cross, and share the ministry of death. Suffering and pain are the burden of that cross, but to lift that burden is to reach for all that is good, and noble and true about being human. May we be given the grace to gaze upon our Lord, recognize and affirm his work among us, and offer to carry his cross as we walk with him to Calvary and to his resurrection

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