I’ve been meeting with this couple every two weeks or so for the last year. They’re getting married in April, and they wanted to do some “premarital counseling” before the wedding. Now there are a thousand reasons why I am a terrible person to walk with them on this journey. But also, at least according to my therapist, there are at least a few reasons why I might be just the right person. So we’ve been meeting via Zoom, and it has been an absolute honor to be invited as a witness into their lives. I doubt I’m all that helpful, but I try to tell stories, I listen hard, I reflect back, and I encourage them to lean in, to show up, to keep going, just keep going. Sometimes, lots of times, we end up talking about things we’ve talked about before. And sometimes, they get a little bit frustrated that they can’t just solve their problems in concrete, sensible ways and then move on with their relationship.
So one day I told them the truth: “Look guys,” I said, “Marriage is a mess. You’re never going to figure it all out. You’re never going to ‘arrive’; there’s no riding off into the sunset, no orchestral ending credits, no ‘happily ever after’, no matter how many fairy tales you’ve heard. Marriage is just a choice. It’s saying, ‘You’re the mess I choose. For the rest of my life, I choose you.’”
It reminds me of this video I ran into on Facebook this week. It’s Disney characters in couples therapy. It’s really funny to me. There’s Ariel and Eric, Belle and the Beast, Snow White and the Prince, Aurora and Prince Phillip. They’re full grown adults now, with greying hair, a few laugh lines, and have put on a bit of post-fairytale weight, but they’re still wearing their dresses and bows and princely uniforms, which is quite amusing. They show them arguing with each other in front of their counselor about little annoyances like loading the dishes in the dishwasher, putting the toilet seat down, their quirky and repetitive habits, and how their romance has fizzled over the years. Some of it, I admit, is a bit inappropriate, but the overall point is both hilarious and poignant: There is no such thing as happily ever after, not even for Disney princesses with big hair and disproportionate physical features. They go through the horrible thing that makes it a good story, whatever that happens to be, and then they finally get what they want, and then the real work begins.
Or reading for today is Peter’s “the honeymoon’s over” moment. This comes off of such an invigorating experience for him.
Just a few verses before he falls flat on his ass in our reading today, he gets the first question brilliantly right. Peter passes the big pop quiz. Lightning strikes, he’s won the Powerball, he’s pulled all cherries, and somehow out of sheer luck, he gets the BINGO. Jesus asks Peter, “Who do you say that I am?” And Peter pulls an answer out of his rear and gets it right, “You are the Messiah.”
So, Peter thinks, “why not try again? I’m doing so well. I’m being so right. I’ve got this. I’ve said, ‘I do.’ It’s smooth sailing from here.”
This is a crucial turning point in Mark’s Gospel.
Jesus goes from saying, “Shhh! Don’t tell anyone that I’m the Messiah!” -- this persistent Messianic Secret for the last seven chapters -- to proclaiming who he is quite openly, announcing that the Son of Man will have to suffer and die and be raised again. It’s a paradigm shift in Mark’s Gospel. It’s the truth about who Jesus is and what his ministry is all about. Jesus came to suffer and die. There’s no walking happily ever after into the sunset -- at least not yet, at least not right now. The messiah is going to come, the messiah is here, right in front of you, and that’s not going to immediately turn everything around. The proclamation of eternal love and the magic true love’s kiss might eventually defeat the powers of evil, but first they’re going to bring even more heartache and more suffering and more evil witches out of the enchanted woods. And that’s hard for Peter -- and for us -- to hear.
Peter goes from being the straight-A teacher’s pet to Satan himself. It’s a radical and difficult turning point for these disciples. The secret’s out: not that God has come to fix everything and make everything perfect and hunky dory and make things happily ever after. Nope. The answer is in the suffering. In the struggle. In the questioning and the doubting. The Messiah has come, not to conquer lands and sit on a king’s throne, but to be tortured, to die, to sit in the darkness for a bit. Things are about to get messy, and they’re going to get even messier. Reserve your therapist now, gather up your copays, you’re going to need it.
This doesn’t end with a white picket fence, a golden retriever, 2.5 kids and a ranch in the suburbs.
And Peter says, “No! This can’t be true! The fairytale that I have set up for myself, the one we’ve always been taught, the perfect stories of a knight in shining armor riding in to defeat the dragon and save the day must be true. You’re the prince, Jesus. You’re the Messiah. You’re the one we’ve been waiting for to free us from the evil sorcerer and his fire breathing dragon!”
And Jesus tells him, “Get behind me, Satan!”
Peter has gotten it so wrong. He failed the test. He’s defined his faith on a false storyline.
That’s not the way. The true way through is dark and messy and painful. But that’s the way. The way is uncertain and hazy and scary. But that’s the way. No amount of magical songs or fairy godmothers or talking mice is going to make this a happily ever after. There’s good coming, but like any marriage, it’s a messy good.
The real story of the Gospel is that it’s going to hurt. It’s going to require some sacrifice. Just as it is inherent in any long-term partnership, inherent in the Good News is a kind of death.
There’s no getting around it. Once you give your life to something, to someone, to anything, that’s it, you’re forever changed. You’re never the person you once were. Even if you end up stepping away from the partnership. The true story of the Gospel is that Jesus is going to suffer and die. The true story of the Gospel is that it’s a journey of struggle and trying and failing and doubting and hoping and trying again. Sounds a lot like my own partnership, actually.
So the big problem, though, with how we’ve lived out this story, is that we romanticize this suffering. We hold on to suffering as a badge of honor, as a definition of true devotion, and even as an excuse to keep our most vulnerable stuck in their oppressive situations. How many women have been told by their spiritual leaders to stay in their abusive marriages? How many struggling, hungry, poor folks have been lifted up and honored because of their humility and acceptance? They’re the “salt of the earth” after all. How many people have pursued pain, or gone without what we really need, or made unnecessary sacrifices because we think that’s how we can experience spiritual awakening? How many have suffered physical, emotional, and sexual abuse in the name of Jesus only to be labelled “saints” after the fact?
The answer is, too many. Far too many.
There’s this really interesting meme going around the social media lately, most recently highlighted by blogger and personal motivator Glennon Doyle. It’s this idea of “choose your hard.” She says, “For me: Pretending was the wrong kind of hard. Divorce was the right kind of hard. For me: Drinking was the wrong kind of hard. Sobriety is the right kind of hard. For me: Directness is the right kind of hard. Empathy is the right kind of hard. Speaking up is the right kind of hard. Being a fully human public woman is hard as hell but it’s the right kind of hard. It’s all effing hard. So maybe it’s just about deciding on the right kind of hard. What’s your right kind of hard?” And I’m really moved by this sentiment. It makes a lot of sense to me. It’s all hard, this life thing is hard, this gospel stuff is hard, the way of Jesus is hard, so what’s the right kind of hard? How can we choose our hard?
But then, as it usually does, this idea got amplified by people of privilege. “Obesity is hard” they said. “Working out is hard.” Choose your hard. As if there's a "better" kind of hard and you're choosing the wrong hard. “Poverty is hard” “Working hard is hard” Choose your hard. Ignorance is hard. Education is hard. Being in debt is hard. Being financially disciplined is hard. Choose your hard. As if these kinds of hard are totally and completely our choice. As if one’s “hard” is just a matter of will and not a matter of racial privilege, socioeconomic status, mental capacity, physical and psychological health, and a whole host of other factors that are not completely in our control.
So it’s that same kind of thing as “take up your cross.”
“Take up your cross”, “choose the hard”, are really important words for us to hear if we are people of privilege, if we have the means to carry and the means to choose, and if it’s for the sake of the gospel, not for our sakes, not for the sake of our personal edification, not if we’re trying to win the award for being the most humble or being the best at suffering the most.
These words of Jesus are for Peter and for the disciples and for those of us who have the capacity to choose, for those of us who have the agency to make decisions, for those of us who have the freedom to do without. Jesus doesn’t tell the blind man to take up his cross, but he does tell the rich young man to give up everything he has and follow him. Somehow, our society has made it acceptable for the rich young man to keep his wealth because he’s earned it, and for the blind man to suck it up, stop complaining, be grateful for the crumbs tossed on the side of the road, and to “carry his cross.” He tells Peter, who has walked with him all this way, who has seen all these miracles, witnessed all these healings, heard all these teachings, and gotten a couple of answers right, to take up his cross. The road ahead leads to suffering and death. But there will be life after three days. But first, Peter, the hard stuff. He’s one of the lucky ones. He gets to choose his hard.
And we’re lucky, too. We get to choose our hard. We get to choose the struggle that we are going to take on for the sake of the Gospel. Because that's the key phrase here - for the sake of the Gospel. For the sake of the Good News. For the sake of freeing the captive and rescuing the oppressed and healing the broken and feeding the hungry and in that way, maybe even saving our own souls in the process. That’s the thing about suffering. It’s inevitable. It’s here. It will always be here. But we shouldn’t embrace it just because it’s there. We should choose the kind of suffering that will actually, you know, maybe, relieve some suffering. Jesus chose to walk the road to Jerusalem, but Jesus tried NOT to choose his cross. He asked God to take it away from him, but he accepted it, eventually, because it was who he is. Deep in his innermost self, this hard that he chose made him more…him. Exactly when he is denying himself he is, actually, finding himself, living in to his true self, being the most Jesus he can be. It’s God being the most God that God can be.
So choose your hard. YOUR hard is going to be messy and difficult and hopefully you’re going to deny yourself for the sake of the other, hopefully for the sake of someone who doesn’t get to have that choice. But in that denial, you’ll find yourself. You’ll find the right kind of hard. There’s no riding off into the sunset, there’s no prince to kiss you awake or dwarves to do your dishes, there’s just the right kind of hard. It’s the mess we choose.
Thanks be to God.
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