30/08/2026
TWENTY-SECOND SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME Year A
20 August 2026
“Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, ‘Far be it from you, Lord! This shall never happen to you.’ But he turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan!’”
Today’s Gospel reading picks up where last week’s left off. Peter has confessed Jesus as Messiah and Son of God, and now, as so often, he puts his foot in it. When Jesus tries to explain to him and the others what being Messiah means, Peter tells him he’s got it wrong. Far be it from you, Lord! This shall never happen to you.
It’s not clear what Peter had in mind. Like many of his compatriots he he may have been thinking of a political Messiah who would rally the nation, throw the Romans out, and reign as King on David’s throne. Knowing Peter though, it’s more likely he just hadn’t thought it all through.
In that he’s not alone. There’s a type of Gospel lite that ignores the fact that we follow a crucified Saviour, and confidently offers believers a worry-free life of prosperity and unblemished happiness. Sadly, though, it wasn’t like that for Jesus; and as Jesus makes plain to Peter and all his disciples at Caesarea Philippi, it won't be like that for them either:
“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”
The problem with these words, well known as they are, however, is that we have tended to do one of two things with them. Either we have trivialized them, reducing carrying the cross to little more than putting up with a difficult relative – Oh, that’s the cross she has to bear – or we have associated Jesus’ language with such heroic sanctity that it seems quite beyond us.
We think of the great saints and martyrs, many of whom bore the cross quite literally in imitation of their Lord, and we think (quite realistically), That’s beyond me. But what does it mean for us to take up our cross in the circumstances of our generally less heroic lives?
Part of that problem is that it’s very easy for us to admire the extravagant gesture, and forget the day-to-day acts of kindness and generosity to which we are all called. Or to put it another way, iIt is no doubt noble and fulfilling to write a cheque for tens of thousands of pounds for some worthy cause, and to bask in the praise we receive for so doing; the challenge comes when we are called to give our lives away in 10, 20 and 50p pieces. Somehow that seems less glamorous, and so much harder to do.
That's where Paul’s words in our second reading today come in, as he calls us to offer ourselves as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God. Because it is in the 10, 20 and 50p we offer that sacrifice; the small change which adds up to truly bearing the cross.
Jesus ends with two harder verses, one forming part of our Gospel, the other going just beyond it. First he speaks about his coming in judgement; and the essence of what he says is that what we do matters. The Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay everyone for what has been done.
It’s a foretaste of the parable of the sheep and the goats, which we hear on the Feast of Christ the King: Just as you did it to one of the least of these, you did it to me.
And the other, just after where our passage ends, as Jesus goes on to say: “There are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”
The first Christians would have interpreted these words in the light of their expectation of the imminent end of all things; as a literal prophecy that some of Jesus’ original band of followers would still be alive on the Day of Judgement. But there is another event which puts these words in context, namely the Transfiguration, which occurs immediately after the events of Ceasarea Phillipi, and which we celebrated on 6 August.
Six days after Peter’s profession of faith, Jesus takes him, James and Andrew up Mount Tabor; and there in a real sense they see the Kingdom come, as Jesus’ glory is revealed and from the cloud the Father confirms the truth of Peter's insight: he is indeed the Son of the Living God, whom all must heed.
More significantly, the Transfiguration marks the turning point after which Jesus begins the journey towards Jerusalem where all that he has been telling his disciples about will come true.
Peter would, of course, be one of those forced to bear the cross quite literally, crucified in Rome within a few years of Paul’s ex*****on by the sword. But we bear our cross no less truly when we deny ourselves for the sake of others, living out the values Paul so simply describes. And in so doing we too see the Kingdom come in our own lifetimes.