Telling Jesus to Shut Up

Shut up and Trouble were walking down a path one day. All of a sudden Trouble got lost. So, Shut up went to the police officer’s station to report the missing person. When he arrived there a police officer asked, “What’s your name?” He answered, “Shut up.” The police officer asked again, “What’s your name?” He once again replied, “Shut up.” The police officer, beginning to get angry, asked, “Boy, are you looking for trouble?” To which Shut up responded, “Yeah, I lost him down a path about two miles ago!”
The phrase, “Shut up!” dates back to 1814. It is a verb that according to Webster’s Dictionary means, “to cause a person to stop talking or to cease writing or speaking.” Wikipedia, the Internet information tool, says that “shut up” is a colloquial phrase meaning “be quiet” and referring to “close your mouth.” It is usually considered to be rude and often said from someone in a state of anger. Despite the fact that it is not a nice thing to say, a lot of people seem to be saying it these days. In fact, if you type the phrase “shut up” on the Internet, you will receive over 45 million results.
Now although Jesus is never recorded in the Gospels as telling anyone to “shut up,” it is the case that throughout the book of Matthew Jesus keeps giving explicit orders for people to keep quiet whenever they discover His true identity. If you have your Bible, feel free to turn to some of these examples: Matthew 8:4 – Jesus cures a man with leprosy and says to him to see that he does not tell anyone. Matthew 9:30 – Jesus heals two blind men and sternly says to see that no one knows about this. In Matthew 16:20 after Peter has confessed that Jesus is the Christ and the Son of the living God, Jesus sternly charges the disciples to tell no one that He is the Messiah.
This is not just the case in Matthew but in the other Gospel accounts as well. Take Mark for example. Mark 1:25 – Jesus drives out an evil spirit and sternly orders it to be quiet. Mark 1:34 – Jesus drives out many demons and would not let them speak because they knew who He was. Mark 3:12 – Jesus gives strict orders to the evil spirits not to tell who He was. Mark 5:43 – Jesus raises to life a dead girl and gives strict orders not to let anyone know about this. Mark 7:36 – Jesus heals a deaf and mute man and commands them not to tell anyone. This particular text also remarks that, of course, the more Jesus did so and tried to get people to shut up, the more they kept talking about it. Mark 8:26 – Jesus heals a blind man at Bethsaida and tells him not to go tell anyone in the village.
Up until this point Jesus has kept His true identity as secret as possible. However, the story that takes place at Caesarea Philippi is a turning point in the ministry of Jesus. Many of you remember this tale. Jesus asks His disciples, “Who do the crowds say that I am?” They give various answers: John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets. Then Jesus asks them, “Who do you say that I am?” Peter blurts out, “You are the Christ, the son of the living God.” Jesus tells Peter that he is correct and that this was revealed to him by their heavenly Father. Simon becomes Peter, the rock upon whom the Church will be built.
Peter’s confession of Christ is significant because from that time on Jesus starts to talk about His future. Jesus tells His disciples that He must travel to Jerusalem where He will go through great suffering, be killed, and be raised from the dead. With our Scripture passage for today Jesus takes the muzzle off the disciples’ mouths. He lets the cat out of the bag. The command from Jesus to shut up and be quiet has come to an end.
The only problem is that Jesus’ conception of what Messiah will be did not jive with what the disciples had been expecting. Peter cannot take the words that Jesus is sharing. He rejects this notion of Messiahship outright. Peter is not ready for such a message to be out in the open for all to hear. He is unable to fathom that Jesus will be defeated by the elders and the chief priests, who with the assistance of the authorities in Rome, will put Jesus to death. So he takes Jesus aside and starts to rebukes Him. When Peter says, “Never Lord,” in effect Peter is telling Jesus to, “Shut up.”
It is important that we not miss the irony in this account from Matthew’s Gospel. Throughout the first half of this book at various points people, and even demons and evil spirits, have made some sort of confession that Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ, the son of the Living God. And every time this happens Jesus commands them to, in essence, “Shut up” and keep quiet. Now, at long last Peter has confessed that Jesus is the Messiah. Jesus has not only told Peter that he is correct but has also called an end to the silence and elaborated upon what being the Messiah entails so that they can now share it with everyone, and what does Peter do? He tells Jesus, “Shut up.”
Jesus does not back down but, in turn, tells Peter to “Get behind me Satan,” for Peter was a stumbling block to Jesus because he did not have in mind the things of God, but instead was focused upon human, earthly things. Now we know why Jesus had to tell people to “shut up” and keep his being the Messiah under wraps for so long, because they would not get it. They would not understand that if anyone would come after Him, they must deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow Him. They were not able to grasp that whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever is willing to lose their life for Jesus Christ will find it.
Jesus has now made it abundantly clear that the conditions of discipleship are anything but easy. Following Jesus is not all fun and games, glory and power. Being a Christian actually entails sharing in the sufferings of Jesus. We are called to deny ourselves, take up our own cross, and follow Him wherever He leads. Accepting this way of life means being willing to deny one’s self to the point of losing your life altogether.
Just like the original disciples, though, for many of us this call to follow Jesus is too troublesome. We would rather have Jesus get on board with what we believe He should think, say or do. We may even say things like, “Okay, Jesus, I will follow you, but here are some rules I would like to lay down before I do.” We place conditions on our relationship with Him, making it clear that we will follow Him as long as He does not say this or ask us to do that. After all, we do not want Jesus to disturb or disrupt the routine and comfort of our everyday existence.
And so when we hear Jesus say something we do not appreciate, we join Peter in telling Jesus to “shut up.” We, just like him, say “Never Lord” to a whole host of things: Never Lord will I worship in a church where they play the guitar, beat the drums, or still use the organ; Never Lord will I become a tither and give 10 percent of my income over to You and Your church; Never Lord will I answer that call when Pastor Robin and the church leadership invites me to be on that particular church committee or team; Never Lord will I consider teaching Sunday school, being a youth group leader, going on a mission trip, singing in the choir, or joining a small group; Never Lord will I dare to speak your name in public; Never Lord will I give to you whatever it is that is keeping me from following you completely and totally.
Please do not hear me wrong. I am not judging you, at least anymore than I am judging anyone of us, including myself. Remember that every time a preacher like me points a finger at you (which I try not to do since who wants to be pointed at), I have three fingers pointing right back at me. This may not apply to you, but as for me, I know that everyday there is some moment where I tell Jesus to “shut up” because I do not want to hear what He has to say. Everyday there is something that Christ calls me to do that I perceive to be too difficult and so I say, “Never Lord.”
When I make such mistakes, I take comfort in the fact not only that God loves me and sent Jesus Christ on the cross to die for my sins, but also that I am not the first person to fall into this trap. Pride is the root of all sins. Think about it: Sin is missing the mark, disobeying God, choosing our own way over the way of Christ. The sin of pride has been around since the beginning of sin itself. It was Satan who first said, “It is better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.” Adam and Eve went down that same path when they ate the forbidden fruit, figuring that they knew better than God. This is why Peter is identified with Satan: because he makes the same mistake Satan, Adam, and Eve do, choosing his will over God’s. And down through the ages, we have all made the same error as Satan, Adam, Eve, and Peter, presuming to know better than God what God desires, so that when we begin to hear the radical, demanding call of Jesus on our life, we too presume to know better than God, take Him aside, rebuke Him, and say, “Never Lord.”
This is why the Christian life is not to be entered into lightly because once we go down that road, “Never Lord” is not an option. We should first count the cost because Jesus does not want us to only give Him part of our life. Being a Christian is like being pregnant. Now I have never been pregnant but my wife Erin just was and I know from her experience that you are either pregnant or you are not pregnant, but no one is a little bit pregnant. Jesus wants all of us.
In his book on essential Christian teaching titled Mere Christianity C.S. Lewis puts it this way: “The Christian way is different: harder, and easier. Christ says, ‘Give me All. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want You. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there. I want to have the whole tree down. I don’t want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked—the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours.’” Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the great German theologian and preacher who was martyred after becoming part of the assassination attempt to kill Adolf Hitler during World War II, says it like this in his book The Cost of Discipleship: When Christ bids someone to come and follow, Christ calls that person to come and die.
As I said before, this is anything but easy. Giving up control of our lives is hard to do. But as the saying goes, “If God is your co-pilot, it is time to switch seats.” Doing this is easier when we, like Peter, also learn that it is not our job to make sure things turn out all right, for this is to be just like Peter in setting our mind on human things; instead, our task is to witness to the fact that Jesus is the Messiah, the son of the living God.Shut up. It is a nasty phrase that we should all try to eliminate from our vocabulary. The good news is that God is willing to forgive us for the times in our lives when we may have told Jesus to “shut up,” those moments when we might have been willing to follow Jesus only up to a certain point, saying “Never Lord” when He asks us to do things outside of our own comfort zones. But there is no need to presume to know better than God what God desires. God wants what is best for each one of us. Jesus Christ offers us the gift of life if we will only deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow Him, for it is in losing our lives that we find the One who is the Resurrection and the Life. Amen.