This morning’s lectionary reading is pivotal to Mark’s proclamation…and it comes at a pivotal time in the life of this and other churches. Today we pivot from our summer somewhat-slower pace to launch a new, fresh program year of ministries and meetings. Today’s Gospel come from the very heart and center, at a pivotal point for Mark’s message.

The first half of Mark’s Gospel recounts stories of Jesus, gathering followers and beginning his public ministry. For months he’d taught, performed miracles, healed the sick, argued with powerful leaders in his faith tradition. He’d calmed storms and drawn crowds…Big crowds!. People listened, opened their eyes and wondered. Who is this man? Some even thought they had an inkling of the answer…

In verses just prior to today’s, Mark tells the story of Jesus’ gradually restoring sight to a blind man …which suggests not only light  gradually being perceived by his eyes but light-gradually filling this chap’s soul. Later, two chapters after today’s story, Jesus swiftly restores sight to Bartimeaus and, on the spot, Bartimaus becomes one of Jesus’ followers. These two eye-opening stories…bracket Mark’s scandalous testimony to who Jesus is, a Messiah who must suffer, die and be raised! Raising the question “What does Jesus’ way of being Messiah mean for followers?

Live that question…as we hear these words and listen for God’s word for us today: 27           Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” 28 And they answered him, “John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.” 29 He asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Messiah.”   30 And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him.

31      Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32 He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33 But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”

34      He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35 For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. 

I must confess: the title of today’s sermon is also the title of a book that was and, still is, significant for my quest to follow on the path of Jesus Christ. Published in 1974, Hunting the Divine was one of Robert Farrar Capon’s first books delving into faith’s great questions: you know; BIG questions like: the soul’s existence, the incarnation, God, sin, redemption, discipleship. As I pondered today’s texts and asked myself Jesus second question…Who do you say that I am?  Without hesitation or prior thought, from somewhere, I answered: “the Divine Fox.”

Now, this may sounds odd. You might not have answered with that image, but I hope you will acknowledge the question “Who is Jesus?” as a question that is perennial as the grass. My answers to Jesus’ question are based in my experience and ponderings. At this point, God-Jesus-the Spirit is still, for me, unfathomable and elusive, un-confineable, unleash-able.  My faith in God, my trust in Jesus and my reliance on the Holy Spirit will always be, I’m convinced, in search of understanding. And I can hope that inch by inch, little by little, I’ll grow into not just one answer, but many. And my search? It’s a lot like hunting. The one being pursued is untamable and free, often hidden and quiet, sometimes evident, loud, powerful, swift, careful, wise, graceful, tender and strong with its young. Irrespective of your opinion on fox hunting, forty and more years ago fox hunting was enjoyed, especially on the East Coast and Europe.   Living in those places, Dr. Capon suggested that searching for answers to Jesus’ identity - and growing in faith as followers – reminded him of fox hunting. “For Christians, “he wrote, “…The language [we employ to name Jesus and God] is [like] a pack of foxhounds and the [Christian, like] the master of the hunt. The hunt master’s job is to feed, water, and exercise his or her dogs so that they will be in peak condition for the hunting of the Divine Fox. Above all, the hunt master must be one who delights in ever expanding kennel full of images, words, reflections, experiences and stories. The Divine Fox eludes the carelessly trained pack, but the City of God awaits the hunter who knows how to look for and pursue Mystery.”   (book jacket)  

So, for the moment, let’s think of Peter and the other disciples as hunters, lured from the sunny shores where they’d been fishing by a mysterious, powerful scent (scent) or hope. They were lured into following someone who performed miracles and wonders, who knew everything they’d ever done, who taught them by hinting that the impossible just might be possible. And through him, they began to see. He draw them into the quest for something More, something highly prized, as prized as a wild fox.   As they followed after him, experiences gradually shaped their answers to his identity and fueled their hopes.  Being around Jesus had been, for them, a rather mind-popping ride, journey. That is, until the revelation in today’s reading, of Jesus’ chosen path. 

 Jesus and his disciples had entered the outskirts of the pagan city, Caesarea Philippi, which was also the locus of the Roman colonial presence on the northern fringes of Galilee.  Perhaps his reputation preceded him in the region and he was curious. So Jesus asked his disciples: What are folks saying about me? (Feasting, p. 71),

Now, remember, in Mark, Jesus is portrayed as not being completely clear  himself about his mission in life…Mark suggests that Jesus’ understanding unfolded gradually as he lived  trusting God. Mark casts Jesus’ time in the wilderness, following his baptism, as a time of sorting from which he emerged ready for public ministry. His mission only gradually became clearer, as did its implications. So he asked and they replied that people thought him among the great prophets of the Jewish tradition, God’s champions, one held in the highest esteem, respect, honor, awe, and love.

Jesus followed his first with a second question, “What about you? Who do you say I am?” And, Peter, bless his impetuous, brave heart, correctly testifies “You are the “Messiah, the Christ”. Yikes!! He nailed it!  Let the party begin!  ….Except…the party never got started…because Jesus commanded their silence and furtively lays out in the open for all of them to see what kind of a Messiah Christ, he will be. One who will suffer, die and be raised. That declaration must have caused something like a mental train wreck in the minds every follower! And it gives today’s followers indigestion, for we want a different portrait of Messiah!

In ancient times, to call someone “Christ” or Messiah was to give that person the right to define what that title meant.  It was up to the Messiah to define the reign and, with it, the meaning of the one making the confession. If that sounds like so much mumbo jumbo…try this not-wholly-adequate-analogy. This week when children of our Nursery School attended “Sneak a Peak”, each one met his or her teacher. These little ones’ notion of Teacher is, at present, fully formed. It will be informed through the kids’ experience of their teacher. Yet, even after 45 minutes, each one can point to which adult is their teacher. They know they are the learners and the teacher is their teacher. They’ve already given their teachers the awesome responsibility of being “Teacher”. The same holds for those Christian education leaders commissioned this morning. Experience will create in the minds of their group members and students what “leader” means, but the roles and authority are a given.   

Peter confessed Jesus “the Messiah,” but was hardly prepared for what Jesus offered as description of what he must face.  And he exploded in horror, speaking with miss-placed superiority and authority. He rebuked Jesus. His outburst was something like! “I won’t have it! This must never happen to you!” Are you possessed? Through words and posture he challenged Jesus: “You’re not the leader here! Not if you’ll lead like that.  I teach you what a leader does!”   In an instant an intimate Q & A session had become a cosmic confrontation, as Mark sees it, between the power of evil and the power of God’s redemptive energy! “Rebuke” after all is an incendiary word. It’s Jesus’ word-of-command to demons, storms, disease…to Satan to leave him. And Peter…even assuming his intentions were the best, had fallen, behaving like a medieval patron, instead being a confessing disciple. 

Seeing the other disciples wavering, Jesus swiftly and authoritatively rebukes Peter. Jesus does not label Peter evil, but returns Peter to where Peter belongs. Literally, ”behind Jesus”. And doesn’t that happen to us? We get weary of following, waiting for God to do something, so we take matters into our own hand, only to be reminded, through some surprise, that we have not been abandon, but rather are provided for, by God. Or we get so absorbed with schedules and commitments, we forget whose we are and then are reminded again through some surprising joy or coincidence that we belong to God.

It is wonderful and not a little ironic that in the sacrament of Holy Baptism, the one being baptized or, in the case of a child, the parents, are asked to answer, in effect, Jesus’ second question: Who do you say that I am?   Oh, the words might be different, but it’s the same question. They might be asked: Who is your Lord and Savior?  or Do you believe in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savoir? And they confess with their answer.

As a congregation, we profess our faith each week we affirm what we believe. This life of faith is a perpetual trip, a learning process, a process, as William Sloane Coffin liked to say: first we leap , then, we grow wings.” 

After Peter was rebuked, I suspect, all tension vanished. Peter was likely not ungrateful to return to where he belonged, for through he had the correct answer, now he knew he still hunted for what following after this Messiah would mean for his life! Jesus invited the crowd to come near his disciples and taught them implications of following, in paradoxical language. His instructions sound to me to mean, “Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat. I am. Don’t run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I will show you how and you will gain life!  That is, you will know joy in taking on life, real life, the life God intends you to live, a life in which you empty yourselves so that you may be filled with the life of God. 

Who is the Jesus? Having learned from Peter’s mistake and his commitment to continue to follow Jesus, today the best we can say, proclaim, may be this, “Jesus is the Messiah, God help us truly to understand what that means.” To the glory of God. Amen