Read all three stories here.
As I read our Biblical texts for this morning, I saw in them both a challenge and a promise – a challenge to get our focus right; to understand who we are; whose we are; and why we do what we do; and a promise that God already knows the answers to all of those questions and will, if we are willing, shape us into the people we need to be.
Let’s begin with the challenge – which, as is so often the case, lies in our encounter with Jesus.
In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus is addressing the large crowd that has gathered around him. These people are not disciples, mostly – not dedicated students who have rearranged their lives in order to put Jesus at the centre of it. Rather, they are people who have heard amazing things and have come to see for themselves. Perhaps they are seeking healing for themselves or a loved one. Perhaps they are hoping to get a glimpse of a show down between Jesus and a Pharisee. Perhaps they are wondering if the rumours are true and this miracle-worker might finally be the One they’ve been waiting for. Or perhaps they just like being where the action is – like the cache of being able to say they were there; of being able to claim a connection; claim discipleship. But Jesus is not interested in being used for entertainment. Jesus is interested in transformation.
So he tells the crowd what discipleship really means – and he uses words no less shocking then than today, challenging everyone’s assumptions about “biblical family values”. Being Jesus disciple requires hating your mother and father and spouse…and even your own soul. It requires being prepared to be murdered by the empire in order to reveal the empire’s power and your own weakness. It requires giving up all your posessions. It requires choosing to put everything else second. And if you aren’t able to do that, than you are not be able to be Jesus’ disciple.
I don’t think I’m able to do that – at least, not very reliably.
So does that mean I am not able to be Jesus’ disciple? Maybe. But maybe not.
Whenever we read the Bible, we are reading two stories (at least). We are reading a story about other people having an experience with Jesus in which he says or does such and such a thing, impacting their lives in various ways we can only imagine. We are also reading a story about Jesus speaking to us, offering us wisdom or comfort or challenge or blessing. Because of these two layers, it can be easy to read every “you” as a direct address to us. But we are not the same people as the people in that crowd – we are not even the same people as the first readers of Luke’s text – who also were not the people in that crowd (so that’s a third story layer). This is important to remember because being Jesus’ disciple may well require different things, here and now. In fact, I am sure it does. Being Jesus’ disciple here and now does not involve leaving your home to follow him around so you can hear him teach and help him with his ministry. Being Jesus’ disciple here and now does not involve making a violently oppressive empire angry enough to want you dead.
Being Jesus’ disciple here and now is simply, for the vast majority of us, not as costly as it was there and then…or as it is now but in other places. And when we simply treat these kinds of teachings as metaphors and compare them to our efforts to live more simple or generous lives or to see family as being about more than blood; we do a grave disservice to those Christians who are called to put their very lives on the line in order to follow Jesus.
Blessed are the persecuted, who bear the full cost of discipleship, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
But what about us? We want to be disciples, too. We want to be included in the kingdom of heaven. What is Jesus saying to us?
We’ll get there – but first, let’s leave our conversation with Jesus for a moment and attend to Paul’s letter to his dear friend Philemon.
Paul is writing from prison where he has been visited by Onesimus, who was enslaved by Philemon and has run away. Paul’s letter does not deny Philemon’s legal rights over Onesimus but he calls on Philemon to act in accordance with the love he knows in Christ and see Onesimus not as property but as a beloved brother, a fellow child of God. For Philemon, Paul points out, following Jesus means ceasing to enslave Onesimus. This will be a costly action – not only will Philemon lose a valuable asset in the person of Onesimus; he may well be setting a precedent for the rest of his economic relationships, too.
Philemon’s discipleship does not look like that of Jesus’ first followers – it looks like Philemon’s.
And ours needs to look like ours.
In the company of disciples throughout the ages, we are called to follow Jesus; to learn from him and join with him in the work of healing and peacemaking and justice building. And there is a cost – we will be asked to make hard choices; to make sacrifices; to give of our time and skill and resources. The questions for us are: what does our discipleship, here and now, require of us and what will it cost us to follow that call.
So there’s our challenge – what of the promise?
For that, let’s turn to our reading from the book of the prophet Jeremiah.
In it, God offers Jeremiah an object lesson: God is to the people of Israel as a potter is to a piece of clay, able to shape it as she sees fit. Of course, object lessons only go so far – the people of Israel aren’t quite so maleable as the clay, able to reject God and God’s plans in a way quite beyond the clay’s abilities, able to choose a dried out, misshapen, brittle form apart from God.
But nonetheless, the promise is there – if the people are but williing, God will shape them into the nation they are called to be – free and fruitful and faithful, a light unto the nations.
If we are but willing, God will shape us into the disciples we are called to be – and not just as individuals but as St. Helen’s. In the potter’s hands, we will be turned into vessels of Christ’s transforming love; made free and fruitful and faithful. In the potter’s hands, we will be made ready and able to pay whatever cost is asked of us.
That’s the promise. We don’t have to raise the money or the troops ourselves. God will make us ready to be the disciples we are called to be – all we have to do is answer that call.
And so I ask you: as a community of disciples of Christ, here and now, what is God calling St Helen’s to do or to become?
As you pray and think and talk about that question, be emboldened by the promise that it is God who will make it possible.