Impulsive Peter

AM Psalm 69:1-23 (24-30) 31-38 • PM Psalm 73
Exod. 1:6-22 • 1 Cor. 12:12-26 • Mark 8:27-9:1

Today’s gospel passage is a favorite, in large part because Peter is to me one of the most interesting—and often enough one of the most comic—figures in scripture. He is if nothing else impulsive. Whatever comes into his head takes the express route to what comes out of his mouth. No stops in between. He was of course originally Simon, but Jesus renames him Peter, from petrus, or “rock,” implying stability, certainty, predictability. You will never convince me that this was not Our Lord being wryly ironic and passing along the joke to us. Calling Peter “the rock” is like calling our present-day The Rock, Dwayne Johnson, “Skinny.”

Today Jesus asks his followers who people say he is. The answers range from John the Baptist to Elijah before Peter, with that typical straight shot from insight to speech, blurts out that he is the messiah. Right, Jesus answers, but keep it on the QT.

But why? Jesus immediately goes into what will come: rejection by all in authority, trial and humiliation and horrific death (and, what surely seemed ridiculous, returning to life after three days). “Huh?” Peter/Rocky seems to have thought: “What?!?! No!!” So the one who proclaimed Jesus as the messiah—the chosen one, God’s appointed, the one to show us the way—moments later turns to the messiah—the chosen one, etc. etc.—and scolds him and lectures him on how he, the chosen one, etc. etc., ought to behave and what he ought to say. Did I mention he was impulsive?

I’ve been there. Sitting in a pew listening to a sermon, reading morning prayer, reading the morning reflection—the principles are clear enough. Love your neighbor (i.e., everyone), forgive intentional harm to you and yours, don’t puff yourself up, look for Christ in everyone. In the abstract I’m fully on board and ready to live it out. Send me in, coach! And then one of my colleagues (neighbors) acts like a total jackass, somebody cheats one of my children, I get some nice professional stroke, a politician proposes a policy of breathtaking cruelty. Love? Forgive? Don't puff? Look for Christ? “What!?!? No!!!”

Time then to listen to Jesus’s followup: “Get thee behind me, Satan.” Peter hung in there. He shut up and persisted, all through his later impulsive slipups. I think our call is to do our best to do the same, bouncing between unlovely impulses and the tough calls to live out what we say we believe. I think of it as The Endless Church Dance. May we all keep dancing.

Written by Elliott West

Elliott teaches history at the University of Arkansas. He has been a member of St. Paul’s for more than twenty-five years.