Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

When Cindy and I moved to Nisswa, it was the 14th move in the time we have been married. Now I long since learned that the best things I can do when we (Cindy) are preparing for a move is to get out of the way when the time for packing starts. I am best off if I basically do what Cindy asks me to do, and sometimes that has been to move aside and let her pack. Same thing applies when we get to wherever we are going. Get out of the way, let Cindy unpack. I literally am a stumbling block to the way she does her unpacking. So let us move on from this image, and do a little unpacking together.

Peter has told Jesus: "You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God!" Jesus had asked, "So who do you say that I am?"

How do we answer that question? Well, last week we confessed that Jesus redeemed us, that he has freed us from all sins, from death and the power of the devil, that he did so with his holy, precious blood, his innocent sufferings and death. We confessed that he did this that we may belong to him, live under him, serve him in eternal righteousness, innocence and blessedness. In other words, we confessed that he is our life and our salvation. This morning, Jesus tells us about life and salvation. Your life and salvation, our lives and our salvation. You might say he unpacks this for us this morning.

I know I have shared with you before that I identify with Peter. Peter who we might charitably say has the best of intentions, at least sometimes, but who also has a propensity for foot in mouth and feet of clay. Peter who is the rock on which Jesus built his church, but who occasionally acts like that rock might be in his head. Peter whose very name means "rock," who is occasionally a stumbling block.

Now Jesus begins to unpack what it means to be the Messiah. Notice how our Gospel starts with the phrase "from that time on..." This means that the disciples through Peter have acknowledged Jesus as Messiah, as the Son of the Living God. This means that a new stage in the relationship of Jesus and disciples has just that moment began.

He tells them he must go to Jerusalem, notice again the word "must" meaning that it is necessary he go to Jerusalem. He is going to suffer and be killed. But Peter utters what is in effect a prayer, but what Peter does not realize is that he is praying God forbid the very thing that God would have come about. A very human response to what a friend, a teacher, the Lord has said. A human response. Gut instinct if you will. Not thinking but speaking, shooting from the hip. A foot in mouth response said by someone who would walk with Jesus but with feet of clay. A response from a rock who interposes his own wants, desires, what he feels to be needs, for what God wants. Someone with whom we can all relate. Peter, knowingly or unknowingly, is tempting Jesus to avoid God's plan of salvation which includes a cross. Peter, like many of us, is deeply imbedded in the values of the world. Peter who only hears what he wants to hear but who does not hear, or chooses not to hear "and on the third day be raised." Of course we would never do that. Of course we do it all too often.

So Jesus responds, seems kind of harsh, does it not? Harsh or not, it is accurate. Satan sustains the life of the world and looking at things from a worldly perspective will block the life and salvations that Jesus brings.

Jesus continues to unpack. We see a cross laid over and into our lives. Jesus tells us that to be his followers we must deny ourselves, taking up the cross, receiving the life given us in our baptisms. In effect we must put to death on the cross a worldly way of life, the values of the world that we have been inculcated in and embraced.

To save our lives we must lose our lives, a contrast with the ways of the world that where grasping is the way to salvation. Losing our lives for Jesus' sake means finding our lives, a contrast with the world where we only lose our life if it benefits our life. So then, what is the value if we gain the world but lose our lives? Think of those you know or who have heard of who make a tremendous impact but then their lives crash making an even bigger impact. What would you give for your life? Six figures? Seven? Even more?

Then Jesus encourages and reassures his disciples, pointing to his resurrection and ascension and his return at the end of time. Jesus says the "Son of Man" is to come with angels in the Father's glory. The "Son of Man" is a reference to the Messiah, the Messiah identified by Peter, the Christ who will plunge right into our afflictions and sufferings.

Jesus tells his disciples, and us, that we will be held responsible, that folks committed to the world and to themselves will live with that eternally. Those who are faithful and committed to Christ will live with that eternally. Then Jesus points to his coming crucifixion and ascension, both of which will occur before his disciples die.

And this, my friends, has a direct impact on your life today, right now and continuing for the rest of your lives. The cross of Christ was traced on your forehead when you were baptized, you were marked with the cross of Christ forever. This is more than just symbolic, it is not just a nice touch to our baptism service. It was done to you, it is done to those who will be baptized, because the person baptized dies to the life of the world and is reborn a child of God, raised to new life with Christ Jesus. A death and new life that happens daily.

I admit that I do not watch much television and have not watched it for many years now, but I keep up with what is going on through internet and news reports. Reality shows and nifty attractive folks without an outward blemish, but who are apparently empty inside laugh at the idea of such a marking. The world claims that there is no sense or hope or purpose in such a marking. We who are baptized, however, realize and recognize that the world is dead wrong. The cross of Christ gives us strength, it gives us hope and it gives us love. It reminds us that our pride, which we love even now, our arrogance, our concerns and fears, all that which the world embraces and encourages, are wiped out by the anger of the Messiah.

Marked with the cross of Christ, we do not hear the world, we pay no attention to the gods of this world, marked with the cross of Christ we recognize affliction, suffering and injustice all perpetrated by the values of this world's gods. Marked with the cross of Christ we rise with the Lord to a new life, drawn into new lives as our old lives are put aside, put to death. Marked with the cross of Christ we are free to live in the world but not of the world, not owned by the world, not trapped by the world and its false values. We realize that all that which blesses our lives is not because of something we have done but because of what Jesus as done for us! The Son rose on the third day and we ourselves rise with the Son every day of our lives and we see the brightness and blessings bestowed upon us.

Jesus would like us to move from the things that bind us, that hold us hostage. He is willing to do the unpacking, because the truth is that only Jesus' crossbearing can empower our crossbearing. Only his death enables us to lose our lives for his sake, to die to sin, self, and selfishness. Only in his resurrection do we find life, here and hereafter.

Our faith is not comfortable and complacent, anything but. Christ bids us take up our crosses and follow him. There is a cross for each one of us. AMEN