Lay Down Your Sword
When someone insults someone or something we love, it’s hard to not take it personally. We see this all the time with sports and if I’m being perfectly honest, I myself am a grave offender. There was a time and day where I was a real, game-following Lakers fan. I knew the players, watched the games, and wore the swag. So when someone—say a Celtics fan—took a shot at my team, I, like any other loyal and passionate fan, would feel anger boiling deep inside me.
Fast forward 10 years. Do I know the players? Not really. Do I watch the games? No. Do I wear the swag? Absolutely. Do I still feel that slow boiling, internal rage steadily welling up inside when my team is mocked? Without a doubt. I am a loyal and passionate fan!
I have this same sort of defensiveness when it comes to other things I’m passionate about. For example, in my single days I had an “Office” test I lived by—a test I often employed on first dates. That is to say, if a girl did not like—or worse hated— the American version of “The Office”, I knew that whatever future we could have had was now completely out of the question. How could I possibly date someone who found Michael Scott obnoxious and not funny? Maybe I was a bit high maintenance (and slightly petty) but I am happy to say that my wife is a huge fan—so maybe it worked?
As with any political season, where our beliefs seem to be on the table, what are we to do when someone attacks, and maybe even rejoices in, mocking something as personal to us as as our world view or perhaps the faith we hold so dear? How do we navigate opposing views that make us feel as though our faith or beliefs are being attacked? Do you feel that slow boiling, internal rage steadily rising? Do we write them off like the small unredeemable population of people who dislike “The Office”? Maybe we feel the urge to confront them like someone who’s just belittled our best friend.
When Jesus tells his disciples that he’s going to suffer many things at the hands of his own people, things like getting smacked and spit on—which ultimately will culminate in him getting pinned to a cross, dying and resurrecting—his closest disciple Peter says, “Never, Lord! This shall never happen to you!”
The very thought of Jesus being attacked, humiliated, and murdered sits as well with Peter as it would have with any one of us if the person we most loved said such a thing: “Never! This shall never happen to you!”
I sometimes wonder if the impulse I have to defend my beliefs would warrant the same response Jesus had to Peter when he got worked up: “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me…”
Does Jesus really need me to fight someone —something Peter would do with a sword later on when Jesus got arrested—or is that very instinct one that would stand in the way of what God is doing?
The world is an in-between place: It’s not “going to hell in a hand basket” nor is God's will always done “on earth as it is in heaven.” There are years, months, days, hours and minutes where corruption, malice, selfishness, and violence prevail, and in some sense, Jesus is crucified. But intermingled in that same space in time, kindness, forgiveness, sacrifice, and selflessness reign too and are greater; resurrection abounds if we are willing to get out of the way.
By the end of his life, Peter had long laid down his sword. He laid down his sword and greater things than that: he ultimately laid down his life. Not only did he get out of the way, but he followed the same way of the one he loved most when he too was crucified. Like Peter, I am sure that I too have stood in the way of resurrection, in one way or another, sometimes knowingly and sometimes unknowingly. But if there’s anything to take away from all this, it’s that maybe crucifixion is a path, a way, the narrow gate even, and when that proud flame begins to kindle inside me, the best thing I can do is lay down my sword and pick up my cross—resurrection awaits.