Göttinger Predigten
Göttinger Predigten im Internet hg. von U. Nembach
5. Sunday after Pentecost , 06/27/2010
Sermon on Luke 9:51-62, by Dr. Luke Bouman
Luke 9:51 When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. 52 And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; 53 but they did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. 54 When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, "Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?" 55 But he turned and rebuked them. 56 Then they went on to another village. 57 As they were going along the road, someone said to him, "I will follow you wherever you go." 58 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." 59 To another he said, "Follow me." But he said, "Lord, first let me go and bury my father." 60 But Jesus said to him, "Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God." 61 Another said, "I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home." 62 Jesus said to him, "No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God."
In Search of Faith
He sat across the table from me at a local fast food establishment. This deeply spiritual young man was talking to me about a decision he had made. He would go to medical school rather than seminary. I nodded, thinking that it was a good decision for him. But something made me wonder, and I probed for the reasons behind the decision. It was then that he started talking to me about his faith journey during college.
"I attended one church," he began, "where the people talked a lot about serving others. But when it came right down to it, none of them were doing it very much. They were serving each other, serving themselves, but there was so much to do in the community and they ignored all of it. I went to another church for a few Sundays in a row, and suddenly I got a letter from the pastor telling me that I was a member. When I asked her about it, she said, that since I already had a church I would be an associate member of her church. I just don't get it. I don't want to be part of a church with such low expectations. I don't want to be part of a church that makes it "easy" for me to be Christian. I want to be part of a church that challenges me to think, to act, to be so much more than I already am."
I began to respond that there are more than two congregations out there when he cut my response short.
"Not to be rude or anything pastor, but can you honestly tell me where I can find the congregation that I'm looking for? I want one that wants to make disciples, not members. If I am going to give my time to something I want to know that it will be well spent, that I will make a difference in the world. So, where is that church."
I drank in all that he said. I knew the pastor of the "church of the three Sunday member rule." She had bragged to others about how many new members she had, that people were looking to belong and her church was growing. I wondered what she would say to my young man. I thought of my own congregation in Austin, Texas, which had nurtured this young man's faith and inquisitive mind. Would they even measure up to his expectations? Most of Christendom, I suspected would fall short. As a rule, most Christians don't want to practice the difficult and demanding faith that is Christianity. They don't seem to want to work that hard.
I wonder if that is what has so many young people, like my conversation partner that day, so disillusioned with the church. They hear, alongside the rest of us, readings like this Gospel reading for today. They hear of the single-minded purpose of Jesus, and his unbending will toward those who would follow him. Then they look around the room at the modern followers of Jesus. These are not people who would give up the certainty of home for the risky business of following a wandering rabbi. These are not people who would walk away from aging parents in order to walk the difficult path to Jerusalem and the cross. These are not, mostly, people who would abandon their plowing, be it in business or education, or some other task, in order to follow Jesus.
It would be easy to blame our society of convenience and leisure. But it appears that even in years past, when people worked demanding hours at demanding jobs, the idea that being disciples trumped all of it was unpopular. It isn't that people, then or now, are lazy. It is just that we go in for the certain, and even for the mundane duty of family obligation more than the risky unknown ventures of faith.
Such seems to be the same world Jesus confronted when he set his sights on Jerusalem. He encounters questions, if not rejection, at every turn. The Samaritans choose to honor an age-old blood feud rather than become disciples. One man asks to fulfill his family obligations first. Another simply wishes to put his affairs in order and say goodbye. At least these latter two seem reasonable to us. Jesus' responses seem strange, harsh even, in the face of these requests.
What Jesus seems to say is startling to people in his day and ours. "Follow me and you will no longer have permanent shelter." "Follow me and walk away from the safety and security of family ties." "Follow me and turn your back on your obligations to your parents." Even those who are not looking for an easy convenient faith are jarred by these words. I wonder what would happen to the preacher today who would seriously suggest such things to a congregation. Would we brand such a person a cult leader? What is Jesus suggesting here and how can we possibly comply? Is such radical extremism even desirable in today's world?
Going to Jerusalem
It is likely important at this point that we keep several things in mind. First, this passage comes on the heels of the Gospel's announcement that Jesus has set his mind on Jerusalem. We must keep in mind that Jesus is telling us where HE is going, what HE has done and is doing. It is Jesus who chooses to wander without a permanent place in the world to lay his head. It is Jesus who has left his parents to be cared for by others in old age. It is Jesus who has left the lathe, hammer and saw of the workshop and not looked back.
Jesus is going to Jerusalem, and readers of Luke's Gospel will know what is going occur there. It has been foreshadowed by Jesus' own passion predictions. It was the point of discussion on the Mount of Transfiguration. Jesus understands clearly that he is going to die there. Those who approach him with the intent to follow him are being warned where he is going, and what fate awaits them.
Jesus does not call his "followers" in order to send them down a different path. Those who would follow Jesus are called to this same road. It is a difficult road. It is a journey, which, if we understand it clearly, is hard for the best of us to follow. It does require that we sacrifice everything, take up our crosses and follow Jesus, literally to the grave. This has been and is the center of the biblical call to follow Jesus from the very first until now.
Part of the problem is that we have domesticated Christianity. We have changed the message. We have made it a religion that helps people avoid suffering and death. It has become, in the 1700+ years since it became the official religion of the Roman Empire, the religion of the powerful, the mighty, those who use it to exercise control over their subjects. It is no longer the religion of the dispossessed, the weak, those who, by following, risk their very lives. A religion of the powerful finds it difficult to ask that power be given up. The difficulty of Christianity in any culture is that it asks us to do that very thing.
This is something that few of us can do, at least not on our own. But the Gospel narrative doesn't stop with Jesus' death. Nor, even, does it stop with resurrection. It doesn't stop with Jesus' ascension into heaven. It doesn't even stop on Pentecost day. During this year of the lectionary, when we read Luke's Gospel primarily, it is no accident that we read this saying of Jesus after we have celebrated all of those feast days. For we, like the first disciples are challenged to follow Jesus after we have been equipped to do so by Jesus himself.
His death equips us to follow because it shows us that God is so committed to our pain and abandonment that Jesus, Immanuel, God-with-us, enters into that pain. We are forgiven, even our inability to commit to following Jesus' path. We are reconciled to God, not because we are somehow able to live the "right" way, even Jesus' way, but rather because Jesus lives and dies our way.
Jesus' resurrection offers us hope beyond hope. We now see that death does not have the last word. That the world's final answer, the end of life, is but the start of God's new creation. This is not to say that we avoid death. Resurrection is hope and life through death, beyond death. It is a hope that offers Jesus' followers courage to embark on this most difficult path.
Pentecost Day reminds us that we are not alone. The disciples in ancient times received the gift of the Holy Spirit and then went out and did all of the things that Jesus called them to do. Luke's story of the ministry of the disciples in the book of Acts shows a church that grew by serving, not by being served. The disciples became as single minded as Jesus, now not turning their face toward Jerusalem, but rather by turning their faces away from it and toward the world. God's mission focus has changed and our direction changes with it. We now follow our Lord into a world that is desperately in need of the good news of Jesus death and resurrection. What sacrifices we might make cannot be anticipated at every turn of this journey, but we know that we are not alone. Jesus goes before us, and the Holy Spirit travels with us. Knowing this is what gives us the courage, the vision, and the faith to follow.
Such things are not found by observing the visible church. It is flawed and stumbles and makes mistakes along the way, as it has for nearly two thousand years, and doubtless will continue to do. We could despair of the "easy" answers of a church trying its best to follow and falling short, just as we can despair of our own lives of faith, as we falter and fall short and require forgiveness again and again. Or we can understand that when we focus on our missteps and those of others we miss the point entirely: that Jesus did not falter, and traveled down this path for us. The question is not whether we will follow the church that we can see, but whether we will follow the body of Christ that is so much larger than the church that we can see, that exists across time and space wherever people give and serve, even to the point of their own deaths and resurrections.
This universal church, beyond the institutional church, exists in and through real human institutions, just as Jesus also took on human flesh and blood. But it is also so much more, just as Jesus was so much more than a mere rabbi.
"I can't show you the church that you are looking for," I said to the young man in response to his question. "It isn't that it doesn't exist, but rather than it is hidden from the naked eye. It exists in spite of, and through, the church that has disillusioned you, which is what makes it all the harder to see. But it becomes possible to see it only through the eyes of love. It starts with God's love for us, undeserving though we might be. When we learn to trust that love, to see ourselves the way God sees us, as beloved children, then we can see others that same way, including the church. God does not want to see us acting selfishly, using our power and position to hurt others, or imagine that by doing no harm we can avoid feeling guilt for the good we fail to do. But God also sees us beyond what we are. I invite you to do the same."
My young friend took in my words for what they were worth. I expect he is still working out how to reconcile what he sees and what lies deeper, what is and what will be. But then, so am I. We ended our time together with a prayer that has become one of my favorites. Originally intended for the evening, it actually works whenever one sets out on any kind of journey, which is every morning, when you really think about it.
"O God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen."