"WHO DO YOU SAY THAT I AM?"

TWENTY-FOURTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME. YEAR B.
September 17, 2006.
(First Reading: Isaiah 50:4-9) (Second Reading: James 2:14-18)
(Gospel Reading: Mark 8:27-35)

"WHO DO YOU SAY THAT I AM?"

In addition to knowing who we are, it is also a concern for us to know what other people say that we are. Like many of us, the Lord Jesus was also interested in knowing what people said that he was.

In the gospel, Jesus appears to be interested in making sure that his disciples have the correct knowledge of who he is, thus, he reveals himself to them so that they could see who he truly is.

The more we reveal of ourselves, the better we will know ourselves, and the better others will know us. The revealing of oneself is a life long process; indeed, it takes a person's entire life to show who he really is.

To Jesus' question: "Who do you say that I am?", Peter responded: "You are the Messiah". However Jesus "strictly ordered them not to tell anyone about him" (Mark 8:29-30) because he knew that revealing his Messiahship to the world required a life long process, a process of dispelling all misconceptions about his Messiahship, a process of demonstrating that the Messiah would have "to suffer much, be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, be put to death, and rise three days later. He said this quite openly" (Mark 8:31-32).

This anticipated revelation of Jesus' own identity seems to run against the grain of the world. The Messiah, as understood by the world (which, according to this gospel passage, is also Peter's understanding), is different than the Messiah as understood and revealed by Jesus himself.

Let us look at these two understandings:
1. The Messiah as Understood by the World.
The world cannot accept a Messiah who suffers, who is rejected, who loves those who hate him, who is put to death. Rather, the world wants a Messiah who is successful according to worldly standards, namely, a Messiah who has power, riches, wealth, superiority; a Messiah who is, in fact, revered by the world.

The world in which the Lord Jesus lived (like our present world) was riddled with injustice, with abusive authorities, with oppressive rulers, with violence among human beings. Those who look for a Messiah according to worldly standards will inevitably fail to see and denounce the injustice and oppression that comes from the world's status quo, from the sinfulness of the world.

The worldly "messiahs" do lead seemingly successful lives for they are able to enjoy their own "prosperity", their own "justice", their own "wealth"; they are directly or indirectly responsible for the injustice, the dispossession, the suffering, the destruction inflicted upon their fellow human beings. The worldly messiahs want to display only the opulent side of their own life, but will hide, at all cost, not only their own sinful life but also the life of those who suffer the injustice, the abuse, the destruction. Because disclosure will bring discredit to the worldly messiahs.

Those who want to save their lives by becoming worldly messiahs will end up loosing it, for they destroy life instead of building it. The gospel reminds us of that when it says, "whoever would save his life, will lose it" (Mark 8:35).

2. The Messiah as Understood by Jesus.
Jesus, on the other hand, shows us that his Messiahship is a radical departure from the powers, authorities, and dominions of the world, from the worldly "messiahs". Jesus demonstrates by his life that he comes to us to redeem mankind from the injustices and oppression of a sinful world(1). Jesus does so not only by placing himself among those who suffer the injustices and the oppression, but, more importantly, by becoming exactly one of them.

Thus the Lord Jesus took upon himself the suffering of being rejected, of been misunderstood, of been falsely accused, of been the victim of a conspiracy, of been put to death and death on a cross. In doing so, the Lord Jesus exposes all the "weapons" and all the destructive power of evil, of the sinfulness of the world. And finally, when he rises from the dead, he demonstrates that he is more powerful than the worldly messiahs, he demonstrates that he is more powerful than death; he defeats death. At this time his Messiahship is fully revealed to humankind.

Today when the Lord Jesus presents us with the question, "Who do you say that I am?" we can answer, "You are the messiah!"
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Footnotes.
(1) The dichotomy spirit and matter, soul and body, spiritualism and materialism has been a part of the church's thought for centuries, and sometimes it has negatively influenced the understanding of the Messiah. As the Church leaned toward the philosophical schools of Spiritualism, it came to established a divorce between spirit and matter, soul and body. A human being was seen then as possessing two irreconcilable natures, one spiritual and the other material.
An inaccurate understanding of the Messiah is that which sees the Messiah only as the savior of the spiritual aspect of man, with exclusion of man's material aspect; or that the Messiah is concerned with the soul, but not with the body. Therefore, the Messiah, in this school of thought, was not competent to redeem man from the injustices and oppression generated by the socio-economic and political systems of the world.