Third Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 9:51-62
When the days drew near for Jesus to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem, and sent messengers ahead. On their way, they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; who did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. When the disciples James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” But Jesus turned and rebuked them. Then they went on to another village.
As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” And, Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” To another he said, “Follow me.” But, that person said, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” And, Jesus said, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” Another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” Jesus said, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
Gifts & Journeys
I’ve been going to church my whole life. I like to tell people that the only reason my family is Presbyterian is because that was the closest church to where my parents lived when I was born, and so that’s where they took me to get baptized. And, they’ve been going there ever since, even after we moved one town over when I was in the third grade, which meant a half-hour drive to church every Sunday.
I liked growing up in the church, and feeling like I was a part of something bigger, even as a kid. But, there were some things about it that I didn’t like, such as the prayers of the people which sometimes felt as long as the sermon. The woman who led the prayers every Sunday was an elder of the church, and she was a really nice person, but she would just go on, and on, and on, until I would start to pray for her to stop.
I’ve never been officially diagnosed with ADHD, but I’ve come to recognize so many of the symptoms in myself over the years, that I’m pretty sure that I have it. This made sitting still in church almost impossible, so being dismissed for Sunday school after the children’s sermon was always a relief. And, even after I was well past Sunday school age, I would still leave after the children’s sermon, so I could be a teacher’s aide, just so I wouldn’t have to sit in church.
Even still, I loved being a part of the church, and I grew to love it even more when I became a part of the youth group. As a second generation American, my parents didn’t really know about youth group, so it wasn’t until I was a sophomore in high school that I first participated in a youth group activity. I was invited to go to Winter camp, and it was so much fun! It changed the trajectory of my whole life. I ended up going to camp a few more times, and doing a few mission trips to Mexico, and I kept feeling this pull to go into ministry. I think the first time that I got the sense that God was calling me to be a pastor was when I was 14.
But, I didn’t want to do it. As I mentioned earlier, I’m pretty sure I have ADHD, and I hated school, ever since I was a little kid. And, I knew that if I decided to become a pastor, that would mean a whole lot of school, and I just really didn’t want to do that. So, for the next 15 years, I kept bargaining with God. I became a youth leader when I was 19, and I thought, youth group is ministry! I can do this, and someday be one of those cool people who can raise their hand at youth worker conventions when they ask who’s been doing this for over 20 years. I always really admired those people. I started a cheesecake bakery, and I thought if I was successful enough at that, then I’d be able to donate lots of money to the church, and that could be my ministry. Eventually, my pastor asked me to go through the commissioned lay leader training program. After completing the program, you could take an additional step to become a commissioned lay pastor, and I thought, this is it. This is my chance to basically become pastor, and not have to go to seminary! I was like all of those people in the gospel reading who wanted to follow Jesus but, first I had to bury my father, or say goodbye to my family. I wasn’t ready for it. I didn’t want it, not really, at least not yet.
The things that Jesus says in this reading are kind of extreme. He sets the bar really high in terms of what it means to follow him, what it means to be faithful. And, the things that he says flies in the face of cultural norms and expectations. I mean, these are just unacceptable behaviors; people would get so angry at you if you did these things. But, I think our tendency is to read this as an all or nothing situation. If someone went and buried their father, and then joined up with Jesus, would Jesus really turn them away? If someone told their family where they were going before they left to follow Jesus, would Jesus really turn them away? I don’t know. My guess is probably not, but having said those things to those people, they would certainly have something to think about as they did follow Jesus, and learned about the Kingdom of God.
The Kingdom of God is all about turning the cultural norm on its ear. It’s about shaking things up and getting people to think about things in different ways. So, by telling his followers that he didn’t have a home, that burying your dead father wasn’t important, and neither was letting your loved ones know where you were going, that to do these things meant that you were not fit for the kingdom of God, would make their heads spin. And, maybe that’s the point. Because, if you think about it, none of us are fit for the kingdom of God.
Life is constantly trying to pull us away from following Jesus. It’s so easy to come up with excuses, to try to get out of our responsibility of being God’s children. Now granted, it is a lot of responsibility. Our reading from Galatians, the well-known “fruit of the sprit” text, tells us that we have been given love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. It is our responsibility to manifest these traits in the world, and be an example for everyone around us. But, it’s not easy to do all of that all of the time. And, it’s a little strange that Jesus’ statements in Luke 9 seem to contradict these things.
Does Jesus want us to take care of our families? It feels weird to even ask that question. The obvious answer is yes, of course Jesus wants us to take care of our families. This is the man who tells us to take care of the widows and the orphans, to heal the sick, to feed the hungry, and to love our neighbor as ourselves. Doesn’t taking care of our families fall under that umbrella? So, what is all of this stuff about not burying your father and not telling your family where you’re going? There’s an almost paradoxical logic to these statements, a seemingly contradictory philosophy that points to a deeper truth. These statements seem to be asking the listeners, “Is God enough? Is God’s goodness enough, or are we still attached to the things of this world, the things that this world tells us to care about?” I think these statements are supposed to give people pause. They’re supposed to make you think about what you value, and why. They remind us that culture and society and family are not the ultimate authority. God is. And, it’s not that we shouldn’t care about those things. It is normal and human to care about those things. But, faith is hard. Doing the right thing is hard, and as we explore our faith, and examine passages like this one, we start to understand the difficult journey that we are on in becoming fit for the kingdom of God.
It feels appropriate that this story is about the journey that Jesus and his followers are taking to Jerusalem, because all of us are on a journey to becoming fit for the kingdom of God.
I really like the metaphor of life as a journey. I like it so much that I made it part of the benediction that I give at the end of every service. To paraphrase something that the Rev. Dr. Joy J. Moore, Professor of Biblical Preaching at Luther Seminary said, “We live in the journey, not at the destination. The journey is where all the stories come from; that’s where all the events happen.”
We are bound to make mistakes, and we will sometimes find ourselves wandering down the wrong path. And, although Luke 9 makes it seem like Jesus expects some kind of perfect faith from us, I don’t think that he actually does. This was a teaching moment, as so much of what Jesus said was. He only expects us to try. To try to love, to be joyful, to bring peace, to be patient, to be kind and generous, to be faithful and gentle, and to exercise self-control. Just to try. Amen.
~ Rev. Charles Wei
