August 31st, 2026
Sunday’s Recap: Acceptance
Guiding Scripture: Exodus 3:1-15, Matthew 16:21-28
Our lesson on leadership this week is about accepting God’s call and learning to balance confidence with humility. Acceptance does not mean we have all the answers. Rather, it means trusting God enough to get behind the mission of Christ and say yes to the next step. Acceptance means we keep following, even as we allow ourselves to be changed along the way.
Our Exodus story took us to the burning bush, where God calls Moses into a divine plan for the liberation of the oppressed Israelites. Our Gospel reading from Matthew shows us how Jesus responds to Peter’s resistance to the mission of Christ. Jesus rebukes Peter, even going so far as to call him “Satan.”
I talked about fire and Satan more than I usually do on an average Sunday, but I hope you noticed that neither was meant in quite the way we might expect.
Fire was not a threat or a punishment. It was an experience we all carry within us. Anger and passion can be fiery emotions. We should not simply extinguish them. We should be angry when we see injustice, just as Moses was angry when he saw his people being oppressed. But Moses allowed that fire to consume him until it led him to violence.
God’s fire does not consume as revealed through the image of the burning, yet not consumed, bush. It calls, invites, and purifies. Our own fire, like God’s, should ultimately burn brightly with love.
Richard Rohr writes about the way anger can mature into grief: grief for a world that allows injustice and oppression, grief for the people who suffer because of it, and grief over our own limitations. Through that grief, we can become more capable of compassion and love.
We do not and should not accept injustice. However, part of acceptance is allowing ourselves to accept the grief that comes with seeing injustice clearly. That grief can lead us away from a fire that consumes and toward a fire that warms, illuminates, and gives life.
When Jesus calls Peter “Satan,” he is not calling him the literal devil with horns and a pitchfork. Satan can refer to an adversary or opponent. Jesus has just explained that his mission will involve sacrificial love and a radically different expression of power. Peter responds that this must never happen. For a moment, Peter becomes an adversary to the mission of Christ.
Both Moses and Peter were called to be leaders. Neither understood that call perfectly at first. Both had a fire within them that needed time to mature into something deeper. We are all on a similar journey. I certainly am. I am not afraid to admit that the fire within me still has more maturing to do. I pray that the fire of compassion and love will continue to burn brighter than any fire of anger, resentment, or hate.
There is much brokenness in our world. There is injustice to confront, grief to carry, and love to embody. This is part of the cross we are called to take up. We have been called not to consume, but to burn brightly with the love of God.
Monday’s Call
This week, we celebrate that there are opportunities to accept God’s call every day. I pray that we can be humble enough to know we do not have all the answers, yet confident enough to get behind Christ’s mission and take sturdy steps forward.
As you move through your week, consider trying one or more of these spiritual practices:
- 🔥 Notice your fire: When anger or frustration rises in you this week, pause before immediately acting on it. Notice what is happening in your body and ask: What is this anger telling me? What injustice, hurt, fear, or grief might be underneath it? The goal is not to extinguish your fire, but to be mindful of how you use it.
- 👣 Practice a faithful yes: Think of one small way God is calling you this week and say “yes.” This is not an invitation to say yes to everything for the sake of pleasing others. It is an invitation to discern where God may be calling you to move.
- 📝 Let your fire mature. Take 10–15 minutes to journal about something in the world that makes you angry. Then ask yourself: What is underneath my anger? What am I grieving? What would compassion look like here? How might love call me to respond? See if you can trace the movement from anger, to grief, to compassion, to love
May our fire burn brightly, not to consume, but to illuminate the way of Christ’s love.
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