1 Peter 4:12-19; 5:6-11 –
Christians in the world share Christ’s sufferings. Christians are to rejoice
over the privilege of sharing Christ’s suffering, and, after suffering, God
will restore and strengthen them. The exhortations to the newly baptized are
continued in this passage. They are warned of impending persecution for being
Christians, for at this time it was a crime to be a Christian. They are not to
be surprised when suffering comes, but to rejoice that they suffer as Jesus
did. When suffering comes, the new Christians are to be humble, trust in God’s
care, be on guard against temptation, and to remember that suffering is over
and God will strengthen them. They are to take comfort in the fact that suffering
is experienced by the whole church.
Ask 25 people what it means to be a Christian,
a follower of Jesus, and you’ll get a wide range of answers, most of them-I’d
guess-centering around some form of prayer, the attempt at keeping the
Commandments, and living a “good” life.
The one word you won’t hear is “persecution,”
because “persecution” means personal suffering, unpopularity, and no doubt
being “un-friended” on social media, which I suppose is the modern-day
equivalent of beheading.
No Christian wants to be persecuted, yet all
Christians make the claim inherent in what they call themselves, to be
followers of Jesus, and it is Jesus who makes no bones about telling his
disciples, that is those who truly follow him, that persecution is a given. You
see it in Sunday's Gospel and Epistle lessons: you’ll be out of the synagogue,
people will kill you believing they are offering God a sacrifice.
In 1 Peter 4, we read that suffering as a
Christian is something to be cherished, moreover, that in his/her suffering, he
should glorify God! Earlier on in John’s Gospel he tells his disciples that the
world hates you, because it hated Christ; it will persecute you, because it
persecuted Christ. Expect to be crucified, because your master was crucified
and a servant is not greater than his/her master.
You’ll notice that this Sunday doesn’t have the
same musical/liturgical bounce in its step as other Sundays have had. There was
hardly a trace of pain in the Sundays leading up to this day, there were no
tears shed as Christ ascended into heaven, in fact we rejoiced that our human
nature too ascended with him!
On Easter 7, known as "Exaudy Sunday,"
there’s no “Christ is risen” high-fiving going on, in fact if you look at the
introit, verse and collect, in addition to the readings, you’ll see the voices
raised are pleas for God “to listen,” hence the term ‘exaudio,’ the Latin name
that lends its name to this Sunday.
Persecution? Not among us, save for what we
often do to each other. None of this, not a single thing, bears even the
slightest resemblance to anything scriptural, let alone St. Peter’s words in
this Sunday’s Epistle, whose call to be “self-controlled and sober-minded” is
met with drooping eyelids, a yawn, and the notion that surely St. Peter meant
the person sitting beside you.
A prayer for steadfast faith: Almighty
God, our heavenly Father, because of Your tender love toward us sinners You
have given us Your Son that, believing in Him, we might have everlasting life.
Continue to grant us Your Holy Spirit that we may remain steadfast in the faith
to the end and finally come to love everlasting; through Jesus Christ, our Lord.
From
text notes in preparation for Easter 7
Image
of Psalm 32, copyright © Ed Riojas, Higher Things
Collect for steadfast faith, Lutheran Service Book
copyright © 2006 Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis
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