March 9: “To really live, I’ve got to really die.” (What Jesus said, and you wish he hadn’t)

That is a stark, harsh saying. I wish we could skirt around it somehow, but if we want to know what Jesus said, well, he said it. Six times in Matthew’s gospel Jesus says he is going to suffer and be killed. No one seems to take him too seriously. We’d all rather there was another way. There wasn’t. So what is this suffering and dying all about? Does this only apply to Jesus, or us too? Where do life and peace and all that good stuff come in? This is a something to listen deeply to.