Loading...Choices, Choices! Oh my goodness, there are so many choices! How do you spend your time? Where to live? What job to get? What kind of bread to get (out of the vast array of options)?!? Or, bless your heart, who to vote for?
Of course, Moses, in these concluding words of his dramatic and powerful speech/sermon is not talking about political candidates, what to major in in college, or what toothpaste to choose from amongst the dizzying array of possibilities.
Rather, he invited, encouraged, exhorted even to
“choose life.”
Which means......?
Which means life trusting in God,
life centered on God’s grace,
life secure in hope from God’s love.
(And, keep in mind that this invitation and exhortation from Moses is taking place within the context of an ESTABLISHED relationship with God, for a group of folks who already were the chosen people – chosen by God.)
We never hear the group’s answer, or even the answer of the folks within the group (note that the exhortation is in the singular, yet it is spoken to all), but God does point out in the next chapter that the people will turn away (again) and that they will forsake God (as they have before).
“I know what they are inclined to do even now, before I have brought them into the promised land.” (Deuteronomy 31:21b)
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We all choose life in God.
And then we don’t.
Then we do again. And then we turn away again.
There is a pattern.
You and I are not the first to sin, to turn away, to forget,
to say one thing but then do another.
There is a pattern: God always claims us and welcomes us back.
God always chooses us. No matter what choice you and I may make.
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Speaking of choices,
Jesus offers us a doozy of a choice!
First, a side note about words and another version of the teaching:
Right now we’re reading stories, teachings, and parables about Jesus from Luke’s Gospel. At the same time, there’s a very similar version of today’s teaching from Jesus that comes out of Matthew’s Gospel. Matthew and Luke tell many of the same stories, but they use a different perspective – a different “lens”, if you will – which often means they use some different words. For example, right here in Luke’s retelling of Jesus’ teaching he writes that Jesus said, “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brother and sister, and yes, even life itself, cannot be my disciple.”
“Hate”
As Matthew re-tells the story, he uses slighting different words: “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me...”
I don’t know about y’all, but Matthew’s version of Jesus’ words sit easier with me. They aren’t so jangly; not so fierce; not so – off-putting!
I’m not trying to say “Yay, Matthew’s Gospel!” Rather, I’m raising the question and the possibility that there’s more here that what meets the eye. There’s more going on in Luke’s Gospel than what we first encounter and feel when we first read or hear Luke’s version of what Jesus says.
“Hate” as we hear it, is loaded with emotion, and even violence. It goes against every grain of what Jesus says about love – love your enemy and love your neighbor. AND, it seems to go against the Ten Commandments, especially the one about honoring your mother and father!
It is shocking to hear Jesus tell us to “hate”.
Yes.
But now you’re paying attention, aren’t you?
Jesus uses hyperboles quite a bit in his teaching and story-telling. And he does that here.
He wants you to think about what you’re doing before you just blithely step into the line of following him. As this story opens, we learn that a large crowd has been following Jesus. He turns to them and says something along the lines of “You want to follow me? Then you have to make a choice! This life of following me is not easy. Everything you have learned and think you know about religion? Set it aside and listen to me.”
Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem.
He does not have a crystal ball, but he knows that Jerusalem is the political and religious center.
He knows that he’s made the political and religious leaders very angry with him because of what he has said, what he has done, and how he has treated people.
And he knows that he will die – somehow and in some way.
The Romans will end up doing the killing (the Jewish authorities are not allowed to do this because of the Romans’ rules), and their primary means of killing difficult, bothersome, rabble-rousing, revolutionary, and radical people is to crucify them on a cross.
Jesus doesn’t have prescient knowledge, but he knows what’s coming.
So, Jesus says, if you want to be a follower,
then you have to give up everything you THOUGHT was important in life. Give it up. Put it aside. Even “hate” it.
Give it up, put it aside, even “hate” it in order for you to love God more,
in order for you to love what God loves more than even your own life.
Following Jesus is not an easy way:
laying down your life for a stranger or an enemy;
loving the outsider, even the one despised by society, because that outsider is one of God’s beloved;
welcoming the stranger even if his or her dress, language, customs, or religion are different, or make you uncomfortable, or are counter to your own.
Following Jesus to the cross is not an easy way:
you must make hard choices and
take the radical way of giving up your own life.
God is first in your life. THAT’S the priority above all else.
Even family ties.
Lest you think that this way of life, this choice for God first above all else, even what you’ve been taught to think is important, is only something that Jesus’ early followers could do (and is not really an option in the “real” world), read again the letter to Philemon from Paul.
Paul has, in previous visits, started a little church community – followers of Jesus – which includes Philemon, a wealthy man, and his household (including a slave named Onesimus). Time goes by and Paul moves on. He eventually ends up imprisoned (he was imprisoned several times because of his missionary work), and, lo and behold, who ends up in prison with him but Onesimus. We don’t know exactly why Onesimus is in prison (did he run away from his owner Philemon? did he get picked up for being a slave without his master nearby? or, maybe he’s not actually in prison, but has been sent by Philemon to serve Paul while he’s in prison?)
Whatever the reason, Paul has come to know and love Onesimus as a brother in Christ. Paul does not see Onesimus as a slave, but as an equal. So, he sends Onesimus back to Philemon with this letter (which we now have in scripture) entreating, not ordering, Philemon to welcome Onesimus back into the household as an equal, not as a slave. Because we are all now equal in Christ.
This may not seem such a big deal to you and I in our contemporary American society, but Paul’s request of Philemon requires Philemon to give up some significant and important things: the value of his slave (there has been an economic investment, after all), likely some social standing with his peers (“Don’t associate with Philemon anymore! He emancipates his slaves! That might just give our slaves ideas.”), and not a small measure of pride.
Following Christ asks us to change our lives and change our priorities. This is a real thing and has lasting and significant impact. Just ask Philemon!
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Don’t just follow Jesus because it’s trendy, or everyone else is, or because being “Christian” is seen as the norm. Following Jesus entails a cost, like the man building a tower or the king with his army against an enemy.
Following Jesus to the cross IS the way of life.
Yes, you give up what you thought you knew and what seemed important.
And, yes, it is very hard.
You will not be able to do it all of the time, but you keep on choosing this life in Christ.
You keep choosing to be changed by the love of Christ.
You keep choosing to love people and the world around you over your own way.
You choose not to live for yourself, but for others.
When you fail at that, you are still loved
and are picked up by God to be consoled and so that you may try again.
Because no matter what choice you have made, are making, or will make,
you are first chosen by God as one of the beloved,
as one of the “chosen people”
as one who is given life.
As Moses encouraged the people many years ago:
“Choose life so that you and your descendants may live loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him, for that means life to you.”
Amen
