FRIDAY AFTER KINGDOM 2
8 November 2013
Readings:
Key Verses (using the World English Bible):
Deut. 26:17, 18: “You have declared today that [the Lord] is your God… [The Lord] has declared today that you are a people for his own possession.”
Luke 9:60, 62: Jesus said, “Leave the dead to bury their own dead… No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for God’s Kingdom.”
Reflection
Today we’re confronted with one of Jesus’ most difficult, and perhaps most incomprehensible, sayings. Out on the road, Jesus asks a man to follow him; the man seemingly agrees, but only on the condition that Jesus first allow him to bury his father. Jesus replies: “Leave the dead to bury their own dead, but you go and announce God’s Kingdom.”
Elsewhere Jesus is quite adamant that he did not come “to destroy the law or the prophets… but to fulfill.” (Matt. 5:17), and indeed later on he cites, with approval, the Fourth Commandment to honor father and mother (Matt. 15:4). But his response today to this unnamed individual appears to destroy, if not the Law, then at least the man’s family ties.
My NIV Study Bible attempts to shed some context behind this exchange, an exchange which is remarkable in its brevity, directness, and lack of backstory or descriptors.
“If his father had already died, the man would have been occupied with the burial then. But evidently he wanted to wait until after his father’s death, which might have been years away. Jesus told him that the spiritually dead could bury the physically dead, and that the spiritually alive should be busy proclaiming the kingdom of God.” (The NIV Study Bible, pp. 1556-1557)
This admittedly sounds obvious. A first-century Jewish son wouldn’t randomly be out and about if his father had just died. It seems, then, like the man was simply making an excuse. He may have wanted to follow Jesus—he did, in fact, call him ‘Lord’—but just not yet.
I’m reminded of St. Augustine’s famous prayer as a teenager, which I’m sure most young adults would understand: “Lord, grant me chastity and continence… but not yet!” St. Augustine had come to embrace Jesus as ‘Lord’, but he felt powerless also to embrace what he perceived were the consequences of fully becoming a Christian. Therefore he wished to postpone his baptism, for, back then, it was believed that sins committed after baptism incurred more punishment than sins committed before.
If the man, like St. Augustine, also wished to postpone following Jesus, then I think there’s still a lesson to be learned, for Jesus tells him, “go and announce God’s Kingdom.” Recall that God’s Kingdom is Jesus’ central message in the Gospels, and Jesus still finds the man worthy to proclaim the message. He need not follow Jesus on the road to still follow him in his heart—and that should be a source of great hope for us. We’ll never be able to walk with Jesus in the same way this man had the chance to, but in our hearts we know there’s nowhere we can go where Jesus can’t be found and followed. There’s no one we need to say good-bye to first because the moment we begin to believe, our hands are already at the plow, ready to plant the seeds of God’s reign of love. We may often be spiritually dead, but we know that the One who has destroyed death is always ready to revive the spirit of the contrite and humble (Isa. 57:15).
No excuses. No looking back.
Prayer of the Day
Sovereign God, ruler of all hearts,
you call us to obey you
and favor us with true freedom.
Keep us faithful to the ways of your Son,
that, leaving behind all that hinders us,
we may fix our eyes on him
and steadfastly follow in the paths of your kingdom.
Grant this through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, forever and ever.
Amen.
—Collect of the 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time in the Book of Common Worship of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)
Hymn: “O Jesus, I have promised”
(Words: John Ernest Bode, 1816-1874; adapted by Joseph A. Soltero, 2013
Tune: ‘Nyland’, Finnish folk melody, adapted by David Evans, 1974-1948)
O Jesus, I have promised
To serve you to the end.
O be forever near me,
My Master and my friend.
I shall not fear the battle
If you are by my side,
Nor wander from the pathway,
If you will be my guide.
O let me hear you speaking
In accents clear and still
Above the storms of passions,
The murmurs of self-will.
O speak to reassure me,
To hasten or control.
O speak, and make me listen,
O guardian of my soul.
O Jesus, you have promised
To all who follow you
That, where you are in glory,
Your servant shall be too.
And, Jesus, I have promised
To serve you to the end.
O give me grace to follow,
My Master and my friend.
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