Are We Like Rocks that have been Thrown Astray..... or An Alternate Exewhatever

Are We Like Rocks... or What I Would Have Said if I Had Chuck's Job.....

My Daughter was using an expensive, cloth-bound scrapbook to bear down on while she drew pictures with Magic Markers. "Sweetheart, don't use that book to draw on it will ruin it..." I told her.
"OK Dad," as she kept on drawing.
"Sweetheart draw on something else.."
"OK Dad."
Until finally I yelled, "Get another book... now!"

If you have children, spouses, partners, or even roomates you know the experience of someone not listening to something you said in spite of the fact that you have repeated it over and over and over. You get to a boiling point until you yell out of frustration and then, finally, they respond. You are amazed/exasperated/furious that in spite of the fact you have repeated yourself over and over they just have not understood.


In the passage in Matthew on which Charles Stanley preached, (See earlier Blog- "Little Man in a Grey Suit..."- without quoting it directly it's the one where Jesus tells the boys about what he thinks is going to happen to him and Peter says, "Say it isn't so!" and Jesus gets mad at him for hinting that he might interfere). Peter is mad at Jesus’ talk about suffering because Peter, as usual, is clueless. He still is living in the old model of the Kingdom of God being a military rule, a tangible time and place. His thinking is Old-School and wants Jesus and the Gang to rule with the same type of power that rulers of that day used. Jesus scolds him, saying , “get thee behind me Satan..” (a later addition that Jesus probably did not say) saying to Peter, “Stop being an idiot.... don’t you listen...?” He had been teaching them, all along, that the Kingdom of God was all around them and within them and not a worldly time and place.

Jesus knew that his message was so revolutionary that the people in power going to kill him because his message of last being first, clean being unclean, up being down and in being out was too upsetting to the establishment. He knew suffering was imminent and that “in three days” (again another addition, but that’s another whole blog) his message would "rise" because according to what he knew about existence, the first was going to be last and the last first. The Pharisees’ political will could not keep the God's Kingdom from happening because it was within Peter, the disciples and all of his followers and therefore immune to any political power or violence.

Jesus, in his own way, though, gave up on “fixing” Peter and his ego and told Peter the truth about his inability to pay attention. Peter was beyond repair and in spite of that (or maybe because of it- who knows?? ) Jesus chose him as his man eventually, in spite of the fact that he was such a screw-up. He was "The Rock" not because of his solidity or strength but because he was, like rock, thick, and basic and elemental- just like all of us. Jesus frustration boiled up because Peter voiced what was probably a common misconception about what his mission was ("Judas, put away the dagger....we love the Romans and we do not kill them...") We are thickheads, like Peter, because we do not really understand the Kingdom Christ described because it is in direct conflict with our power-hungry, ego-obsessed reality. It violates Capitalism, Communism, Democracy, Republicanism and several other isms that we are so fond of.

How can our world exist when the first are last and the last first? What do you mean, God, that I have to sell my huge house and let all the weird homeless people in my neighborhood move in? (Try and sell that one to the Inman Park Neighborhood Association)?

God answers quietly to us, "Yes..."

"What do you mean, God, that I have to scaled back my expectations for ambition and power and spend more time at home with my kids at night??"

God says, "Absoultely..."

"What do you mean, God, that I have to give up more and more of what I hold precious in this life, the things that I crave and covet and think I need??"

God says, "Sure you are.."

"What do you mean, Lord" we plead, "Am I supposed to feed all the poor people standing out on Courtland street every day- go get lunch for them all at Mary Mac's Tea Room?"

God says, "Why not?"


"But Lord," we plead, "That just does not make any sense??? These events and things must happen for me to be happy and get what I deserve...."

And God replies, "What you deserve?? Lay those ideas and conceptions you have on your own cross, my friend, against all logic and worldly standards and you will suffer by the Pharisees, the world will call you stupid, maybe even take you down several notches.. and I will raise you up..."

These things are hard to hear and comprehend. We, like "The Rock" are thick and hard to break and heavy with the things that we hold as dear and vital.

But you know, if God can get water from rocks, he can also give them ears to hear.

Selah