Yes…but

Luke 9:51-62
As a professor from Luther seminary remarked[i], “this verse is the hinge of Luke’s gospel.”  This verse, verse 51 of chapter 9, is the turning of the story in Luke.  A time when the wide angle lens on Jesus’ ministry focuses in on a narrow shot as he makes his way to Jerusalem and the cross. 

 Actually, if this passage were a movie, I can imagine the scene as follows:

 The camera focuses on Jesus and his disciples.  Right behind them, you spot the little child whom Jesus had just brought by his side as he tried to talk with his disciples about what “greatness” meant and did not mean in the realm of God.  That child, grinning from ear to ear about being included by Jesus, is slowly walking back to her parents. 

 The disciples have a variety of looks on their faces, ranging from disbelief to puzzlement to joy.  Some of them look preoccupied, as if they know what is coming next.  Others look just plain tired from all the travel and the hectic schedule of ministry that Jesus likes to keep.  And then, as the narrator intones “When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem…” the journey music begins to play in the background. 

 The camera moves from the faces of Jesus and the disciples to pan out on to wide expanse of Judean countryside until it focuses on the city of Jerusalem far into the distance.  And there, outside the town, almost behind the city-scene, you see three crosses looming, so the audience is quickly reminded what will happen once Jesus arrives. 

 And then the camera purposefully moves back to Jesus’ face.  And we see that any amusement caused by the child has been erased.  His mouth is set in a taut line.  One look at his face and all you see is focus and determination.  His weather-worn forehead is creased by lines formed by purpose.  You watch as Jesus starts to walk.  The camera increases the atmosphere of urgency as it pulls in for a tight shot of Jesus’ feet as he starts to make his way.  The music swells as the journey to Jerusalem begins.

 And that is the atmosphere of our Scripture reading for today.  That highly pressured, highly tense, highly focused atmosphere surrounded Jesus and his disciples as they made their way down the road.  And so, given that kind of atmosphere, we are immediately surprised when the first thing Jesus wanted to do on his way to Jerusalem—highly focused, very purposeful Jesus—was seek hospitality from the Samaritans.  Nothing about that decision made any sense.  In Jesus’s day, the Samaritans and the Jews experienced a “less than cozy” relationship.  They had come from the same religious tree, but had branched out in very different ways.  But each group claimed they were the true people of the covenant. 

 Each group had its own Scriptures that it followed and held up as divinely given.  Each group had its own Temple that it held up as the proper place for true worship.  And each group saw the other ones as people falsely claiming the status of being Abraham and Sarah’s descendants.  In Jesus’s day, you could cut the religious and national tension between the people of Samaria and the people of Israel with a knife.  And yet, the first place Jesus wanted to try and find a place to stay was with the Samaritans.  The first place he decided to go after setting his face to Jerusalem was to try and bunk with the enemy.

 But unfortunately, that desire for fellowship was not reciprocated by the Samaritans of that particular village.  For the Samaritans quickly figured out that Jesus was Jerusalem-focused, not Mt Gerazim-focused, which was their holy place.  So they must have decided that since he was not one of “them,” then they really had no need of him. 

 But from what Luke writes, Jesus did not let it get to him.  He did not seem to be that affected by their lack of response.  I would imagine it saddened him, because that stay was clearly important since he wanted to start his journey with them, but he let their rejection just roll off.  Jesus was focused and determined.  He was not going to let a little inhospitality stop him.  He had a job to do.  He has a message to proclaim.  He had a purpose

But James and John were a different story.  They were not quite so focused.  Rather, they took the village’s rejection of Jesus very personally.  “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” they asked, with a lot of enthusiasm for that little project.  If it were not so violent an image, it would be funny. 

 For in the beginning of chapter 9, Jesus had given some instructions about the proper way to travel as a disciple.  And part of his instructions was that if anyone refused to welcome you, you do not get all bent out of shape about it.  You simply shake the dust off of your feet and keep moving.  For as those proclaiming the good news of the realm of God, you have work to do.  You do not have the time to waste and get off track.  You keep moving, proclaiming, healing, and teaching.  Too little time and too many miles to cover.

 And yet, even though Jesus had been very clear, James and John had forgotten the lesson.  For they immediately jumped on the chance to return evil for evil.  They jumped on the chance to respond with revenge and retribution.  Come on Jesus.  Let’s burn ‘em up!  Let’s throw a little hellfire their way.  Vengeance is mine, sayeth the disciples. But Luke writes that Jesus barely let them finish their sentence before he strongly rebuked them.  For even though Jesus has begun his journey to Jerusalem with rejection, he was not willing to respond in kind.  And furthermore, he was not willing to allow his disciples to respond in kind either.  For revenge and retribution and playing judge and jury were causing them to get off-track.  Those things were not part of being a disciple, following Jesus.  Jesus had set his face to Jerusalem.  He was focused.  He was determined.  His shoulders ached with the tension of what was to come and yet he was going there anyway. 

 Discipleship and following him had to be priority number 1 if the gospel message of God’s realm was to be proclaimed.  If repentance, healing, reconciliation, and the Good News of God’s grace and mercy had any chance of being proclaimed to that broken, hurting world, then disciples had no time to get sidetracked by a desire for revenge and judgment.  God was God.  The disciples were not.  So they just needed to set their own faces and follow.  I am sure that Jesus was already running out of patience for these distractions on his way.  Let us send fire to consume them?  Puh-lease.  Focus, men.  Focus. 

 Therefore given all that was already weighing on Jesus as to what awaited him in Jerusalem, given the fact that his disciples were already trouncing on his last nerve, it is no wonder why Jesus responded to the next three questioners with both a sense of urgency and exasperation. 

 As Jesus and the disciples continued on the way to Jerusalem, they encountered three candidates for discipleship.  “I will follow you,” the first one said.  “Really?” Jesus responded.  “Because being my disciple means that you do not have a place to lay your head unless someone gives it to you.”  And even though Luke does not tell us what candidate number 1 said in response, my guess is that it was something like, “Hmmm.  Well, maybe I will first go and catch up on my rest then.  It sounds like it is going to be hard work.  Perhaps now is not the best time for me to follow.  I will let you get things a bit more settled first.  It still sounds like you are in the beginning phase of your plan.  When things are a bit more organized, I’ll catch up to you.  But don’t wait up.” 

 Then Jesus walked by another candidate for discipleship.  This time, Jesus initiated the conversation.  “Follow me,” he said, with his face still set Jerusalem-bound and the urgency reverberating in his voice.  “Hmmm,” that one responded.  “Yes, I will follow you…, but first I have to go and bury my father.  I have some serious family obligations that I must tend to.  You know how it is, Jesus.  I have responsibilities and priorities.  Now is not the best time for me to follow.”  And while we wish Jesus sugar-coated his response, instead he responded with tough words,  words with which I struggle, “Let the dead bury their own dead.  As for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” 

 And I wonder if Jesus had to then bite his tongue to not say something like, “Look I know that family is incredibly important but do you not understand?  We do not have time to waste.  I am headed to Jerusalem.  Now is the time to follow me.  It is not later.  It is not ‘when it is convenient.’  If you want to follow me, you have got to make your walk the priority.”  But that candidate might not have heard any of that anyway since he was probably running back to town as quickly as he could, yelling out, “I’ll catch up with you later.  But don’t wait up.” 

 By this point, if Jesus had not felt grief over the whole Samaritan rejection; if he had not felt grief over James and John continually misunderstanding who he was as the Word of Life; if he had not felt grief over the first candidate for discipleship who responded with a “Yes, but…”; then surely by now, all of it was starting to get to him. 

 He had set his face for Jerusalem.  He had not repaid rejection of him with rejection by him.  He had refused to sugarcoat the demands of discipleship in order to get more members to sign on the dotted line.  And as a result of all that, his walk to Jerusalem was already getting very lonely even though he was surrounded by people.  So can you imagine what it felt like during that third conversation?  Another candidate for discipleship came up to Jesus and made a heartfelt statement.  “I will follow you, Lord… but first I need to go back and say goodbye to those at my home.”  Jesus must have had a headache by then.  I am sure that Jesus understood goodbyes, but there was no time for goodbyes.  There was no time for “Yes I will follow, but…”  There was no time for anything that kept discipleship from being the number one priority.  He was walking to Jerusalem.  He was going to his death.  If there was ever a time for getting priorities straight, this was it.  It may not have been the best time in the lives of those candidates for the demands of discipleship, but it was the only time.  And with either anger in his voice or sadness, Jesus responded to that third candidate by saying, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” 

And sisters and brothers, that is still true for those who follow Christ.  We cannot faithfully follow Jesus if we are constantly looking backwards at what might have been.  We cannot faithfully follow Jesus if we are constantly looking to the left or to the right in order to find a better option for life.  We cannot faithfully follow Jesus if we are simply looking at discipleship as just one more way to be a well-rounded person and to live with a higher quality of life.  We cannot faithfully follow Jesus if we are not willing to try and be all-in, knowing we will never fully get it right, but always trying to head in the right direction anyway. 

As a senior high youth succinctly stated, discipleship is not for wimps.  It is demanding.  To be a disciple of Christ means that our response needs to be “Yes” more often than “Yes…but.”  It means the words “now is not the best time for me” better be carefully considered before being uttered.  Because even though we no longer get to see Jesus’ face set for Jerusalem, the urgency of discipleship is still high.  The world is still broken and hurting.  The crosses still loom on the horizon.  And God continues to yearn for the message of repentance, healing, reconciliation and the Good News of God’s grace and mercy to be proclaimed and lived by all of God’s children.  Now is not the time for us to get sidetracked either.  Follow me, he continues to say.  What is our response?