Lesson 70
March 5, 2010
Luke 14:25-35
The Cost of Being a Disciple
When
my wife and I became active in the church again after being alienated from it for more than a decade (more on that some other
time), I made two of the dumbest mistakes you can make in church life. As a new member of the congregation we'd chosen to
join, I was asked to serve on a committee. Here comes the first mistake: I said ‘yes' without finding out first what
the committee did. Then I made the second mistake - I missed the first meeting of the committee. That's how I found myself
as the chairman of the Stewardship Committee. In a Presbyterian church, that's the committee that challenges members to give
generously to support the work of the church. (As John Housman once said, "We make money the old-fashioned way: We go
out and beg for it.")
Now, I couldn't do much about having to miss the meeting, but the first mistake was a real
blunder. I agreed to be on the committee without even asking what I was going to be expected to do. I didn't really consider
the cost - in time and effort - of being a member of that committee.
That's what Jesus is warning some prospective disciples
about (and, for that matter, what he's warning us about) in this week's lesson. He's warning that
there's a cost to being one of his disciples, and that it's foolish to say you want to be a disciple if you haven't thought
about that cost and made a sober decision to pay it.
This passage begins with a comment that Jesus now has large crowds
following him around, and apparently he decides these people needed to face the fact that his ministry in the world is not
a carefree camping expedition. So Jesus turns to the crowd and makes a startling announcement: If you want to be his disciple,
you've got to hate everyone in your family.
Now, one point needs to be made here: scholars say that the word "hate,"
as we have it in English, is misleading. Remember that Jesus spoke Aramaic, and his words were then translated into Greek,
and we read them another step down the translation highway - in English. People who spoke Aramaic had the custom of stating
things very strongly in order to make a point. The phrase Jesus probably used actually meant something more like "to
love much less." The point Jesus is making isn't that his disciples should be consumed with hatred for their families;
it's that if a time comes when a disciple has to decide between Jesus and family, the decision should already have been made.
Jesus is to be the highest priority.
And Jesus goes on to present an image that really can't be softened much: If you
want to be a disciple, you have to be willing to carry your own cross, and Jesus would soon carry his. That's a thought that
would probably make most people in the ancient world shudder, especially anyone who had ever seen a crucifixion.
Then
Jesus presents two examples of how foolish it is to set out on an endeavor without first thinking about how much it will cost.
If you start building a tower but run out of money, people will think you're pretty dim. And a king who's thinking about fighting
a war better think about whether or not he has enough troops to win it. If not, he'd be foolish not to consider a "diplomatic
solution."
Same with being one of my disciples, Jesus says - if you're not willing to pay the price, you're never
going to make the grade.
The point is that we have to be willing to give up all the things that entangle us in this
world - family and relationship ties as well as riches, pleasures, etc. All of us should hope and pray that our loved ones
will support us in our walk of faith. But if it doesn't work out that way, which of our competing loyalties can promise us
eternal life?
Questions: What entanglements in your life prevent you from living a life of greater discipleship?
Are any of them really just excuses that could really be accommodated in living a life of more active faith?
The
great German pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote one of the finest books ever on the Christian life. It's entitled
The Cost of Discipleship. That great book has been widely read by Christians for over 65 years, in spite of the fact
that the central statement of the book is a hard one to face: When God calls a person, God calls that person to die. Now,
when we're confronted with that statement for the first time, it's kind of a shock. And then it's a little puzzling, because
not every Christian is murdered for their faith. (Bonhoeffer was - the Nazis hanged him just days before the end of World
War II.)
But when you think about it, there are at least two ways in which that stark statement applies to the life
of every person who wants to be a disciple of the Christ. First of all, accepting Jesus as the Lord of your life means accepting
the possibility that at some point, you might actually be called upon to lay down your life for your faith. It comes as a
surprise to most people to learn that the persecution of Christians is more of a problem today than it was during the Roman
Empire. In fact, some experts estimate that more Christians were killed for their faith between 1990 and 2000 than in any
other ten-year period in the history of the church. Most American Christians live in safe neighborhoods and never take much
of a risk for the sake of the faith. But if that's really true of us, can we really claim to be living a life of discipleship?
The
second way Bonhoeffer's statement applies to all of us is that when we become disciples of Jesus, we are all called to die
to our old life and begin a new one. That's what baptism is really meant to symbolize: death, going into the water in symbolic
burial, and then resurrection to a new life in Christ. (Unfortunately, many of us come from traditions that baptize infants,
so we lose that central meaning of the baptism symbol - so we just say baptism is about "washing away our sins.")
The point is: our life after becoming a disciple of Jesus is supposed to be a new life altogether, with new values and priorities,
and a new authority as opposed to the authority of the powers of the world.
When you really think about it seriously,
that means our new life is lived in opposition to the world - standing against the materialism and hedonism of the world,
but also standing against nationalism and worship of military might. A faithful disciple of Jesus should probably be equally
offensive to those who consider themselves conservatives as to those who consider themselves liberals. Which means that the
cost of discipleship might really mean your life - or at least, being a faithful disciple might well mean risking the way
of life you're come to know.
Questions: What do you think it means that
most Christians tend to ally themselves with one side of the social and political spectrum - to be either liberal or conservative?
Do you think this means we sell out some of our Christian principles to support "our side" in the great debates
of public life?
Jesus ends this little talk by using a little figure we're familiar with. Jesus compares his
followers to "the salt of the earth." (Matthew 5:13) And here, he says if it loses its saltiness, salt is worthless.
(Now, the salt we get at the grocery store doesn't lose its saltiness. But the salt they used in his day was gathered from
the shore of the Dead Sea, and it wasn't pure salt; it could lose its saltiness.) Our saltiness is the flavor our
lives get by being lived "in Jesus." If we fail in our commitment to him, then we lose our distinctive flavor. We're
neither of the world nor of the kingdom. We're nothing.
And when you get down to it, that's what Jesus is warning us
against - the meaningless life that comes when we make a half-hearted half-commitment to him. Only by being ready to cut the
ties that entangle us can we really know what it is to live an abundant life of discipleship.
Questions to carry
away: What do you think of when you think of Christians being "the salt of the earth?" What flavor are the disciples
of Jesus supposed to give to the world?
See you next week.
Grace and Peace,
Henry