When Jesus told his followers

When Jesus told his followers the trials that were to come,

He spoke in truth, held nothing back, relentless as a drum.

But Peter would not hear this word, and his rebuke was strong;

Yet then his Teacher called him out, and he was named as wrong.

 

For those who would this Teacher claim, the path was stark and clear:

Deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Jesus dear.

For you who to your own life cling will lose it all the same,

But you who let your own life go a new life you will claim.

 

How will we live, what shall we do, in answer to this word?

Will we, like Peter, let our faith by human things be blurred?

Or will we lay aside such things of human-bound design

And follow as our Savior leads, and hold to things divine?

 

 

TEXT: Charles Spence Freeman, February 2024, after Mark 8:31-38.

MUSIC: Tune RESIGNATION, USA folk melody, Lewis's Beauties of Harmony, 1838.

 

 

Sometimes, it seems, we might need to be more diligent about understanding how some of the hard scriptures still apply to us. This text is an attempt to lean into that task.