Two tabloid regulars made the news again this week: Charlie Sheen for addictive behavior and unmitigated arrogance and Lindsay Lohan for theft and probation violations. The actor Martin Sheen, Charlie’s father and a Catholic Christian, has requested the public to pray for his son; it is, of course, the appropriate response of a father and the appropriate response of the Christian public: Lord, have mercy on Charlie, Lindsay, and on me, a sinner.
Sheen and Lohan point to a great Christian truth, ignored at our peril: Humans do not engage sufficiently in self-destructive behavior. Please read the last sentence again carefully; it is no mistake. The mistake lies in describing Sheen’s and Lohan’s behavior as self-destructive. It is not; it is self-indulgent, and the difference between self-indulgent behavior and self-destructive behavior is salvation itself.
“When Jesus calls a man, he bids him come and die,” Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes in The Cost of Discipleship. In this he echoes Jesus’ won self-destructive invitation:
If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it (Mt 16:24-25, NKJV).
Self-destruction is the cost of discipleship.
The sacrament of baptism – the initiatory rite of Christian discipleship[1] – should alert us to the self-destructive nature and demands of the faith. Baptism is preceded by renunciation: of Satan and all the spiritual forces of wickedness that rebel against God, of the evil powers of the world which corrupt and destroy the creatures of God, of all sinful desires that draw [us] from the love of God. If we do not understand these renunciations as acts of self-destruction, we have been inadequately instructed. Then, the thanksgiving over the water reminds us that the baptismal font holds death – life too, but not before self-destruction: “We thank you, Father, for the water of Baptism. In it we are buried with Christ in his death.” Finally, the baptism itself, if administered by immersion, vividly portrays death and burial. We enter life only through self-destruction. St. Paul writes:
1 What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? 2 Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? 3 Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? 4 Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.5 For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, 6 knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin (Rom 6:1-6, NKJV).
Even after baptism – especially after baptism – we must continue and escalate our self-destructive behavior. Though the power of sin has been broken, its effects remain; these are rooted out bit by bit, throughout a lifetime, by diligent and continual metanoia (repentance), a synonym for self-destruction.
1 If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. 2 Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. 3 For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.5 Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these things the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience, 7 in which you yourselves once walked when you lived in them. 8 But now you yourselves are to put off all these: anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language out of your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old man with his deeds, 10 and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him (Col 3:1-10, NKJV).
And, if this putting off is self-destructive, so, too, is the putting on that discipleship requires.
12 Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering; 13 bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do. 14 But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection (Col 3:12-14, NKJV).
These words do not describe the self-indulgent public persona of Sheen and Lohan; too little do they describe my private persona. And so, I thank God that the season of Lent is rapidly approaching. In it the church invites us to embrace self-destructive behavior: to renounce all that separates us from God, to live the death of our baptism, to put off self and put on Christ – to die again and again, bit by bit, in the sure hope of Pascha and resurrection. For the way of self-destruction – the way of the cross – is ultimately the way, and the only way, to life.
Almighty God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy but
first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he
was crucified: Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way
of the cross, may find it none other than the way of life and
peace; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.[2]
Sheen and Lohan point to a great Christian truth, ignored at our peril: Humans do not engage sufficiently in self-destructive behavior. Please read the last sentence again carefully; it is no mistake. The mistake lies in describing Sheen’s and Lohan’s behavior as self-destructive. It is not; it is self-indulgent, and the difference between self-indulgent behavior and self-destructive behavior is salvation itself.
“When Jesus calls a man, he bids him come and die,” Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes in The Cost of Discipleship. In this he echoes Jesus’ won self-destructive invitation:
If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it (Mt 16:24-25, NKJV).
Self-destruction is the cost of discipleship.
The sacrament of baptism – the initiatory rite of Christian discipleship[1] – should alert us to the self-destructive nature and demands of the faith. Baptism is preceded by renunciation: of Satan and all the spiritual forces of wickedness that rebel against God, of the evil powers of the world which corrupt and destroy the creatures of God, of all sinful desires that draw [us] from the love of God. If we do not understand these renunciations as acts of self-destruction, we have been inadequately instructed. Then, the thanksgiving over the water reminds us that the baptismal font holds death – life too, but not before self-destruction: “We thank you, Father, for the water of Baptism. In it we are buried with Christ in his death.” Finally, the baptism itself, if administered by immersion, vividly portrays death and burial. We enter life only through self-destruction. St. Paul writes:
1 What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? 2 Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? 3 Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? 4 Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.5 For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, 6 knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin (Rom 6:1-6, NKJV).
Even after baptism – especially after baptism – we must continue and escalate our self-destructive behavior. Though the power of sin has been broken, its effects remain; these are rooted out bit by bit, throughout a lifetime, by diligent and continual metanoia (repentance), a synonym for self-destruction.
1 If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. 2 Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. 3 For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.5 Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these things the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience, 7 in which you yourselves once walked when you lived in them. 8 But now you yourselves are to put off all these: anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language out of your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old man with his deeds, 10 and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him (Col 3:1-10, NKJV).
And, if this putting off is self-destructive, so, too, is the putting on that discipleship requires.
12 Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering; 13 bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do. 14 But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection (Col 3:12-14, NKJV).
These words do not describe the self-indulgent public persona of Sheen and Lohan; too little do they describe my private persona. And so, I thank God that the season of Lent is rapidly approaching. In it the church invites us to embrace self-destructive behavior: to renounce all that separates us from God, to live the death of our baptism, to put off self and put on Christ – to die again and again, bit by bit, in the sure hope of Pascha and resurrection. For the way of self-destruction – the way of the cross – is ultimately the way, and the only way, to life.
Almighty God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy but
first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he
was crucified: Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way
of the cross, may find it none other than the way of life and
peace; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.[2]
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