Suka uSatan!

Sermon for 16th Sunday after Trinity – 15 September 2024 – St John the Baptist, Felixstowe

Text: 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. (Mark 8v35)

God give you peace my sisters and brothers.

Last week I greeted you with the words Good Moaning’ and together we spent time revelling in the English speaker’s penchant for fracturing other languages so wonderfully demonstrated by Officer Crabtree in the TV series ‘Allo, Allo’.  This week I want to cut to the chase and read part of today’s gospel in its original and most powerful language.  No not Greek or Hebrew but Xhosa!  Yes, yes I know that amongst the tribes of Southern Africa the Zulu like to think they are foremost in God’s thoughts, after all the word ‘Zulu’ declare them to be ‘The Children of the Sky’.  And of course we must not forget the Basotho people who, in the mountaintops of Lesotho, inhabit the Kingdom closest to heaven.  But it is the Xhosa people, whose colours I wear on my stole today, who speak God’s language.  How is this so, you may ask?  ‘Simples’, I reply.  When Jesus turns on Peter and reminds him of the mission of the Messiah, what brings more impact, the English ‘Get behind me, Satan!’ or the majestic Xhosa phrase ‘Suka uSatan!’  If I were old Nick I know which one would send me running back to the underworld with my tail between my legs and it would be Suka uSatan!  

What a majestic turn of phrase.  But isn’t Jesus being a little harsh on Peter?  After all nearly halfway through the Gospel of Mark, surely Jesus has realised that Peter (and most of the disciples for that matter) are, like Monty Python’s flying sheep, a little bit dim?  For Jesus to be this severe on Peter there must be a very important lesson to learn here.  And so there is.

Jesus is taking this heavenly struggle seriously.   Peter has just got one thing right – figuring out that Jesus is the Christ (the Messiah).  Then Jesus tells Peter to not tell anyone about it AND tells him off when Peter complains about the way Jesus is going to demonstrate that He is the Messiah.

This being the Son of Man, being the Messiah who will bring salvation to all people is a very tricky affair.  It will cost Jesus everything and knowing the future price He does not want anyone, even his closest disciples, to put obstacles in His way.  To keep on the path he needs to say to Himself as much as to Peter Suka uSatan!

So, after chastising Peter He goes on to tell everyone what life has in store for them… death;

If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.³⁵For 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.   (Mark 8v34-35)

This is not an easy path and there are many temptations along the way (have a read of John Bunyan’s wonderful A Pilgrim’s Progress if you want to investigate just a few of them).  

Jesus reminds His listeners, and this is the truth of life, that our time on this world is not about titles or achievements – being ‘John the Baptist; Elijah; even the Messiah – but about how we let go of the world in which we live.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, writing from Tegel prison before he was later hung at Flossenburg Concentration Camp said:

The cross is not the terrible end to an otherwise God-fearing and happy life, but it meets us at the beginning of our communion with Christ.  When Christ calls a man, He bids him come and die.

The only way to the life after life is through death.  

If we heed Our Beloved’s warning of Suka uSatan! we are on the road of saving our life by losing it.  But if not, if we continue to let ‘the world around us squeeze us into its mould’ (Romans 12v1-2 Philips) we are on the road to being lost forever.

Living is about dying.  From the day we are born we begin to die.  Each day, each month, every year, we fade away.  Babys, which much pain and tears, grow their milk teeth and then loose them soon afterwards.  Men grow hair all over the place and then baldness strikes (with some of us trying to get ahead of the game by shaving our heads).  And everyone knows that none of us are as young as we used to be.  We are not so much living a life as dying a death.

And there are only two ways to live, which can be described as two ways to die.

We can listen to the whispers of ‘The World, the Flesh, and the Devil’ and live our lives for ourselves alone.  When we do this we take our lives for ourselves and commit suicide.

Or we can say Suka uSatan!  to ‘The World, the Flesh, and the Devil’ and live our lives for others.  When we do this, when we hand ourselves over to be crucified, others live because we have learnt to die to self.

When we were baptized with the sign of the cross our death warrant was signed.  We have chosen to die to self, if not why are we here this morning?   

We have chosen to give ourselves away.

When Christ calls a man, He bids him come and die.

Ouch!

If we have for one nano-second stopped to think about the consequences of our actions we know this to be true.  It is the Gospel Truth.  As the apostle Paul reminds us:

If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord; so then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.  (Romans 14v8)

Occasionally we will get it the wrong way around, as did the disciples on the Mount of Transfiguration but eventually we will hear the core message of the Gospel of Mark:

… for even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many.                                                                            (Mark 10v45)

Our Beloved Redeemer is determined to ‘undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.’ (Mark 8v31). 

Can we, dare we, attempt anything less?

The next time we find ourselves tempted to be a little bit more selfish.  

That little bit less giving.  

That little bit more thinking ‘It’s somebody else’s problem’.  

That little bit more holding on to ‘stuff’ instead of letting go of ‘The World, the Flesh, and the Devil’.   

May we together say, in our best Xhosa accent of course, ‘Suka uSatan!’  

This blog  ‘Suka uSatan!’  is copyright © Andrew Dotchin 2024.  It may be reproduced free of charge on condition that the source is acknowledged.

Peter Declares That Jesus Is the Messiah  

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?’ ²⁸And they answered him, ‘John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.’ ²⁹He asked them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’ Peter answered him, ‘You are the Messiah.’³⁰And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him.

Jesus Predicts His Death

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. ³²He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. ³³But 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.’

The Way of the Cross

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.³⁵For 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. ³⁶For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? ³⁷Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? ³⁸Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.’

(Mark 8.27–38)