Where I am going you cannot follow Me now, but you shall follow Me afterward

 

 Simon Peter said to Him, "Lord, where are You going?"  Jesus answered him, "Where I am going you cannot follow Me now, but you shall follow Me afterward."  Peter said to Him, "Lord, why can I not follow You now?  I will lay down my life for Your sake.  Jesus answered him, "Will you lay down your life for My sake?  Most assuredly, I say to you, the rooster shall not crow till you have denied Me three times."

 

- John 13:36-38 

 

In our previous reading (John 12:27-36), Jesus was preparing for His journey to the Cross, His hour of glorification.  He said, "Now My soul is troubled, and what shall I say?  'Father, save Me from this hour'?  But for this purpose I came to this hour.  Father, glorify Your name."  Then a voice came from heaven, saying, "I have both glorified it and will glorify it again."  Therefore the people who stood by and heard it said that it had thundered.  Others said, "An angel has spoken to Him."  Jesus answered and said, "This voice did not come because of Me, but for your sake.  Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out.  And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself."  This He said, signifying by what death He would die.  The people answered Him, "We have heard from the law that the Christ remains forever; and how can You say, 'The Son of Man must be lifted up'?  Who is this Son of Man?"  Then Jesus said to them, "A little while longer the light is with you.  Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you; he who walks in darkness does not know where he is going.  While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light."  These things Jesus spoke, and departed, and was hidden from them.  

 Simon Peter said to Him, "Lord, where are You going?"  Jesus answered him, "Where I am going you cannot follow Me now, but you shall follow Me afterward."  Peter said to Him, "Lord, why can I not follow You now?  I will lay down my life for Your sake.  Jesus answered him, "Will you lay down your life for My sake?  Most assuredly, I say to you, the rooster shall not crow till you have denied Me three times."  In today's reading, the lectionary skips ahead, to the end of chapter 13.  Jesus and the disciples are at the Last Supper, and this conversation takes place just prior to His last address to His disciples.  My study Bible comments on this passage that Jesus' first words to Simon Peter ("Where I am going you cannot follow Me now, but you shall follow Me afterward") are in fact a prophecy of his martyrdom.  St. Peter would suffer martyrdom for the sake of Christ by being crucified upside down in Rome in about AD 67 (see John 21:18-19).  

In today's short reading, at first glance we might think that the focus is on Peter's denial.  But my study Bible places the emphasis on Christ's prophecy of Peter's martyrdom which is to come, Peter's own great sacrifice for the sake of the gospel (Matthew 10:39, 16:25; Mark 8:35; Luke 17:33; John 12:25).  If we take a look at some of the other passages which accompany this one in today's lectionary reading, we see a common theme of sacrifice.  The Old Testament reading is from Genesis 22:1-14, the story of Abraham's being called to sacrifice his son Isaac.  This story seems to many people to be cruel; they wonder why God would call Abraham to do such a thing, even if God did not intend for this to happen.  After all, Israel lived side-by-side with hostile neighboring peoples whose gods demanded such things.  But if we look closely at the story, it is not a story of a god demanding cruelties in order to be pleased, but a story even about God's provision, of unexpected abundance.  It is a story of trust in God, and yes, sacrifice in the sense that Abraham reserves nothing in his love for and obedience to God.  But in the end, seeing a ram caught in a thicket, Abraham names the place The-Lord-Will-Provide.  This is a story of absolute trust in God, even in the most difficult of circumstances, the sacrifice of what we love.  It's echoed in Christ's prophecy of Peter's own martyrdom, a trust that entrusts everything to God's providence, even one's own life.  The other Gospel reading from John gives us a different kind of a sacrifice.  John 19:38-42 tells us the story of two wealthy and powerful men of Jerusalem, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus.  Both of them were members of the ruling council.  Nicodemus we know was a Pharisee (John 3:1).  Joseph of Arimathea was a wealthy man (Matthew 27:57), and also a prominent ruler on the Council (Mark 15:43).  Joseph, in going to Pilate to ask for Christ's body, was making a very courageous and bold choice, and risking everything in his life to do so, for as a member of the Council which pressured Pilate to put Jesus to death, he is defying them and their conclusions about Jesus.  After all, Jesus as a crucified Man is in some sense declared among the worst of criminals according to the Roman laws of punishment.  In this sense, He "became sin" for us (2 Corinthians 5:21), taking on this mantle of public shame and condemnation that went with crucifixion.  Joseph moreover donates a new (and quite expensive) and unused tomb hewn in stone (suggesting it was his own tomb; see Matthew 27:60), while Nicodemus donates the expensive myrrh and aloes for burial, a public act of love for Christ.  Both of these men risk their lives, their substance, and their places in the society to do so.  My study Bible says that according to some early sources, Nicodemus was baptized by Peter and consequently was removed from the Sanhedrin and forced to flee Jerusalem. St. John Chrysostom has suggested that Joseph of Arimathea was among the Seventy noted in Luke's Gospel (Luke 10:1-17).  At any rate as believers in the early Church, there is no doubt of what persecution and loss they faced.  When we look at each of these sacrifices -- the apostleship and martyrdom of St. Peter, the near-sacrifice of Isaac by Abraham, the public donations and declaration of devotion to Christ by Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, what we see are various forms of "investment" that comes with entrusting one's life and devotion to God, and all the things that are a part of one's life and oneself.  None of these men knew necessarily what the future held, but their whole trust was in God, in Christ -- Abraham, the first to know the promise; Peter the wavering disciple who would become leader and martyr; and the prominent men of the Council, Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea.  Each one made choices for a willing sacrifice, an exchange for something more powerful, more essential, a deeper entrusting to God and to God's provision, whether in their own lives or in the greater story of the salvation of the world (John 3:16).  Jesus, of course, goes to the Cross, showing us all what it means to sacrifice for love.  We are now concluding the period of Lent (next week for the Orthodox), a traditional time of the practice of sacrifice, of fasting.  Let us consider these passages and what it means to learn to make choices based on discernment, to sacrifice or give something up because we are essentially investing in something better, greater, that commands a deeper and greater love and loyalty.  This is the substance of what it means to choose, especially when we come to a crossroads.  A marriage is similar; there will be sacrifices we're called to make for the sake of a marriage, or of a child, or an elderly parent.   There will be times when an investment in where God leads us becomes the risk we take, the worthy sacrifice for something more beautiful, more good, more true than whatever other appetites or desires would call for.  This is why we learn discipleship, so that we may become the "sons of light" Jesus names in yesterday's reading, above.  Let us walk in His light, even when it is difficult and there are hard choices to make, for we know the road and the Kingdom it leads to.