Peer Pressure

Mark 8:27-38

And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, "Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things."

Peer Pressure is setting our mind on human things. It is falling prey to the human condition, the tendency to not follow our own gut/God instincts about what is right and doing something entirely different.  Or, in the words of a youth: "When someone tries to get you to do something just because they say everyone is doing it."

Notice the reality check there.  Not that everyone is doing it, but that the word on the street is the presumptive notion that everyone is doing it.  The spoken reality versus the actual reality.

When Jesus starts telling the disciples that he will suffer and die in the days to come, Peter gets angry and rebukes him.  Word on the street would indicate that 'saviors' don't get killed. Everyone knows that saviors do what everyone says they should do.  Behave the way a Messiah should behave.

And Jesus says, very sternly, "Satan get outta the way."  Aware that the master tempter is once again in place to make Peter and the others feel that if Jesus was really any kind of savior, he would do what word on the street proclaims of a Messiah.

When do we follow what the world tells us and what our gut tells us?  Preteens and teens are classically thought of when we hear the words peer pressure, but we all succumb to it on our own ways.  In our homes, in our lives, in our institutions, especially in our churches.

We have to do it the way the cool kids do it.  Or the way word on the street says it should be done.  I know as a pastor I often feel pressured to find the cool kid way to do things, or I feel pressured to do it the way we are expected to do it.. the way "they say" everyone is doing it.  And I fail to follow my gut/God instinct.

Peer pressure is actually a form of anger, in a way. We are trying to validate our choices by making others do the same as us.  Even when we aren't happy, necessarily, with the choices we have made. We might be angry that life isn't smooth sailing, so we pressure everyone else into getting on our ship of doom and poor choices.

What is at the root of peer pressure, or societal normalizing?  Why do we do it?  What does it mean to follow a Christ who bucked societal norms at every turn?

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