29th Sunday in Ordinary Time – October 22, 2023

St. Paul – Lyons, KS

Isaiah 45:1, 4-6; Psalm 96:1, 3-5, 7-10; 1 Thessalonians 1:1-5b; Matthew 22:15-21

Martyrdom or Bust

When you think about your development, your progress as a Christian—like, what’s the goal? What are the benchmarks? How do you know you’re “getting there”? The easy analogy is school, because we had to deal with that at some point in our lives. School develops you as a person, prepares you to be a functioning member of society. And yes, we have grades and benchmarks, but whether you have a sixth grade education or a Ph.D. school was preparing you for civil life, life in the world. Same thing in the military: you have physical tests you need to pass, technical skills, intellectual skills. And yeah, not everyone is going to be a Navy SEAL, but everyone is preparing (ultimately) to serve their county, even to the point of giving their life. But what about your development as a Christian? What is the goal, the benchmarks? How do you know you’re “getting there”? You go to Mass? You can answer questions about the faith? You learn Hebrew or Greek so you can read the Bible in its original language? You’re really nice? What is the goal, the benchmarks? How do you know you’re “getting there”?

And I was listening to a very wise, very holy bishop speak, and he put it this way: “In imitation of Christ, martyrdom is the pattern for fulfillment as a disciple of Jesus, and so preparation for this heroic witness is the measure for Christian formation.” Martyrdom, giving heroic witness. In the Church, martyrdom doesn’t just mean physically dying for your faith. Martyrdom comes from a Greek word meaning “to give witness.” So yeah, in our tradition, it technically refers to someone who gives heroic witness to their faith by their death, by being killed for their faith, but every one of us is called, is aiming toward a life where we give heroic witness to our faith in Jesus. Again, think of the military: they are all being prepared for a life that may involve literally laying down their life, but not everyone does. What each and every one of us is called to do is to bear heroic witness to our faith. And through that, to turn the world upside down.

This is why the story of the martyrs are so important for us. Their stories are all about the world being turned upside down. I think of people like Saints Jean de Brébeuf and Isaac Jogues. Jean and Isaac were priests, Jesuit missionaries here in North America. They were originally from France and grew up in the 1600’s with the best of everything: high culture, attended the best universities, you name it. But they left it all in order to take the gospel message into the wilderness of North America, into this New World. Here they served the Huron people, the Huron Indians. But they also walked into a land full of roving bands of Iroquois who wanted nothing more than to kills every Huron and Frenchman they found. For years they ministered to the Huron people, heroically bearing witness to their faith in Jesus by giving up their entire life to come here. And eventually they even faced literal martyrdom. Jean de Brébeuf was captured with many other Huron who had decided to give their lives to Christ—and I’ll spare you the details, but he had to watch the people he had encouraged to give their lives to Christ be brutally killed before he himself was killed. Isaac Jogues had fingers burned, cut, and chewed off. And he even made it back to France, but begged to be sent back—where he was eventually killed. But look: by the time of their death, 7,000 people had decided to give their lives to Christ; 7,000 Native Americans had become Catholic. This New World was being turned upside down through their response of faith in Jesus. Their faith wasn’t just about going to Mass, or knowing facts about the faith, or learning Hebrew or Greek—although they did! No, their faith, the way they responded to their faith was to prepare to give heroic witness to their faith, even through persecution, even to the point of literal martyrdom. And through a response like that, they turned the world upside down.

Turning the World Upside Down

Today we’re starting a new series we’re going to call, “Turning the World Upside Down.” We’re going to be reading Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians today and for the next four weeks. And this letter is really pertinent to us today.

While Paul was on his missionary journey he eventually arrives in a place called Thessalonica. And for three weeks, he preached about the scriptures, and how it was necessary for the Messiah to suffer and die, and how this Jesus is the Messiah. And you know what? A lot of people believed him, they placed faith in his teaching and gave their lives to Jesus Christ. But almost immediately, other people got upset. They swarm the house Paul’s staying at, looking for him, ready to kill him—and so these new Christians (couple of weeks of being Christian) they have to sneak Paul out of town. And they continue to live in this persecution.

But why were the people so upset? Well, Paul’s announcement of Jesus as the true Messiah, Jesus as the true Lord of the world—it led to people saying that these new Christians were defying Caesar. And literally, go read Acts 17, the people say this, “These people are turning the world upside down.” Why? Here in the United States, people start new religions and new churches all the time. “Who cares? Let them live their life.” Yeah, that’s our attitude. But think about what we’ve been talking about for months now: they had faith, true faith, had placed their lives completely into Jesus’ hands (they got in the wheelbarrow); and because of this, they saw the world in an entirely new way (they had a true Meta Nous, a change of mindset)—all of which meant they responded to life in an entirely new way. Their faith was changing their lives. And notice: their faith, their response to their faith, the witness they gave to their faith, was taking the world by storm. Literally, they were described as “turning the world upside down.”

And what’s more, they almost immediately faced persecution for it. Paul was only there a few weeks, but by the time he left, they were already beginning to face intense persecution. And yet they didn’t waver. When Paul write this letter to them, it’s within a month of them giving their lives to Jesus. But already he is commending them for their “work of faith and labor of love and endurance in hope” (1 Thessalonians 1:3). Within a month! Most of us have been Christian, Catholic our whole life! But have we given a response this intense? Our formation as disciples of Jesus Christ should have been preparing us to give heroic witness to our faith, even to endure real persecution. Do we feel like we could do that?

Caesar (et al.) vs. Jesus

Real quick, why did they face persecution? Did you notice that? Who cares if they want to worship Jesus? That’s our attitude, right? Who cares if they want to worship Jesus, or Buddha, or the three-headed lizard god of the sunflowers. Did you notice? What is the reason for their persecution? They’re turning the world upside down, yes, but what in particular are people noticing first? They said Jesus is the true Lord of the world—and lived it! And who was the lord of the world at that time? Caesar, exactly. People realized that if you are a follower of Jesus, you’ve switched allegiances. That’s what turned the world upside down.

A couple of weeks ago, we read the account of Jesus and his disciples at Caesarea-Philipi. And that day Peter confesses, “You are the Christ (the Messiah), the Son of the living God” (c.f., Matthew 16:15-16). Who else had the title “son of god”? Caesar! It was printed on every Roman coin: “Caesar Augustus, son of god.” So Peter’s confession—it’s a confession that says, “Jesus is the true Lord of the world, not Caesar.”

And word of this must have been getting around, word that people were calling this Jesus guy the “Son of God”—and people must have been getting curious. And so they set up this situation to trap him, this scene in our Gospel today. And they ask, “Is it lawful to pay the census tax to Caesar or not?” Taxes have little to do with this. It’s a conflict over who Jesus is, who Jesu thinks he is, who people seem to be saying he is. And Jesus very famously, takes coin, a coin with Caesar’s image and title, “son of god,” and says, “Pay back to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.”

But what is he getting at? That there should be a separation of Church and State? No, that’s that Modern Progressive vision of ours talking again. What is Jesus getting at? Jesus is saying that he’s not after money or power or “lordship” as the world thinks of those terms. Jesus isn’t after money. Jesus is after you, your life, your heart—you. “Repay God what belongs to God—you.”

And this is precisely what Jesus has been calling people to do, calling his disciples to do: to begin to live their lives not according to the way the world thinks (it’s standards of power or status) but the way he thinks, and to give their lives to him. In other words, he calls them to metanoia (Meta Nous) and to faith (to entrust their lives to him, to get in the wheelbarrow).

The Thessalonians Went All In. Can I?

And so when Paul goes out on his missionary journeys, he doesn’t call people just to go to Mass and be a nice person, he calls people to the exact same thing. And there is Thessalonica, there after only three weeks, people respond. And their response is powerful. These people—again, within a few weeks—these people are giving heroic witness to their faith, are enduring intense persecution for their faith. “Caesar isn’t the true lord of the world, Jesus is. And if he is, then my life—my life can not longer be measured and understood through the lens of Caesar, and money, and power, and status. My life is Christ.” And that turned the world upside down.

Like I’ve been harping the past several weeks, we don’t give our allegiance to Caesar—that’s not our problem. Our problem is what? We’ve given our life, entrusted our life to, placed our faith in a Modern Progressive vision. The Modern Progressive vision is “lord of the world”! “If we just work really, really hard, if we as humans keep progressing—we will eventually progress to perfection, we’ll find the happiness, and meaning and purpose and everything our heart desires. 

I just heard this same vision being parroted again this week! And the person quoted the Bible, so they made it sound like a true homily. But the example he used was human flight. In 1903 the Wright brothers flew this thing they called a plane—first flight, couple hundred feet. Only 44 years later, Church Yeager broke the sound barrier. Only 66 years after first flight, man steps on the moon. Couple hundred feet to the moon in 66 years. And because of this technological progress, he was asking the question, “Well why can’t we as a society and as a people progress too?” Once again, it’s the whole, “We’ve landed a man on the moon, so we don’t need God anymore.” He’s placed his faith in this Modern Progressive vision. But in this speech, he was so flustered and upset, asking, “If we can land a man on the moon, why we can’t seem to progress socially and morally too?” And what’s the answer? What can you go tell him? Because the Modern Progressive vision is a false gospel; it can’t fulfill on all of its promises. Caesar had a gospel; also a false gospel. And so Paul shows up inviting the people to metanoia (to have a change of mind)—to metanoia and to faith in Jesus (to give their life, to entrust their life, to place their faith in Jesus). Paul invites them to give their lives to Jesus in faith. And when they did, it began to turn the world upside down.

“Chosen”

Friends: it’s no different for us. Just replace “Caesar” with “Modern Progressivism.” And I can guarantee you, people will start saying of us—just like they did of Paul, just like they did of the Thessalonians—“These are the people who are turning the world upside down. They’re acting against the Modern Progressive vision—and they’re saying that there is another king, Jesus.” And just like the Thessalonians, people aren’t always going to like that. Here in the United States you won’t be physically persecuted for your faith, you won’t face literal martyrdom—because here we are just nice to people, tolerant, let people live their own lives. But if you’re living it, people will begin to wonder about you. They’ll wonder why you don’t prioritize your life like everyone else does. And people will “let you live your life,” which means some people may stop wanting to hang out with you—because you’ve changed; or they’ll stop inviting you to certain things. And we shouldn’t be surprised by this. Paul knew it. The Thessalonians knew it. Saints Jean de Brébeuf and Isaac Jogues knew it. We’re not being formed to be nicer. Our formation prepares us to give heroic witness to the fact that Jesus (and no one and nothing else) is Lord.

Over the next four weeks, we want to break this open, to dive in to what this looks like concretely in our lives. How do we respond? What does it mean to concretely give our lives to Christ? What steps do I need to take? What does this look like?

But as we begin, just notice one simple thing from Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians. “You were chosen.” We tend to put ourself in the driver’s seat, to say, “Yup, I figured life out. I got my life together. I’m going to follow Jesus.” No. “You were chosen.” It’s like we talked last week with Joan of Arc, remember her line? “I was born for this.” In walking this path, in following Christ, it is going to take a lot of courage—not everyone is going to pat you on the back for following Jesus. But begin with that line from Joan of Arc and that reminder from Paul: “I am not afraid. For God is with me. I was born for this”—“You were chosen.”

Here at this Eucharist, once again, we aren’t here because we decided to be here. We’re here, fundamentally, because we’ve been invited, called, chosen. “Blessed are those called to the supper of the Lamb.” God called you, chose you. And you responded—you responded to that call and are here today. But God calls you in a much deeper way: He calls you to respond with your whole life, and through that response, in the best way possible, to turn the world upside down.