Luke 9:51-62
Do Christians Follow Jesus?
James Sledge June 27, 2010
Imagine that one evening you are visited by an alien from some distant planet. He’s a friendly alien. He has no weapons, is very polite, and says nothing about being taken to your leader. But he is curious. He wants to know about you and your culture, but mostly, he wants to know about religion. He says, “Please tell me about your beliefs and practices.”
“Well, I’m a Christian,” you say, which of course means absolutely nothing to this alien, who looks a bit befuddled. Sensing the need to say more you add, “We follow Jesus, God’s Son. One title for him is the Christ which is how we got the names Christians.”
“Oh,” says the alien, still looking confused. “But what does it mean to follow Jesus or to say he’s God’s son?”
So you try again. “God sent Jesus to save us. He died for us, but then he was raised from the dead. And we believe in him, and that saves us.”
“Saves you from what?” asks the alien, looking, if anything, more confused.
“From sin and death,” you say, but you are beginning to worry that you’re not doing a very good job at explaining the faith, and so you decide to try a different tack. You get a Bible, suggesting that perhaps it would be better if he simply reads about Jesus, and then ask whatever questions he has. You point him to the gospels, and he begins to read.
After a while he looks up and speaks. “This is very interesting. And this Jesus is a most intriguing fellow. And you are one of his disciples? Are there many others?”
“Oh yes, there are very many who follow him,” you respond, feeling like now you are getting somewhere. “A majority of the people in this country are Christians.”
“Then it must be a most wonderful place,” the alien says.
“Yes, America
“Well I assume that there is no war or violence,” says the alien. “Jesus clearly tells his followers to love their enemies and not to return violence with violence, to pray for any who abuse you and to bless whoever curses you. Aren’t Jesus’ followers all pacifists?”
“I can see how you would think that,” you say. “And some of Jesus’ followers are pacifists, but not very many. We all agree that war and violence are bad things, but sometimes you have to fight to help people or to keep evil from taking over.”
“Oh,” says the alien, beginning to look a bit confused again. “I didn’t see where Jesus made any exceptions to loving your enemies, but I am new to this. But surely there are no poor people in your country with all its Christians. Jesus speaks a lot about how he brings good news to the poor. He says that God has a special love for the poor. Surely you Christians have ended poverty.”
You start to look uncomfortable as you respond. “Yes, Jesus does speak of lot of the poor, and we Christians do many things to help the poor. At my church we collect food for the hungry and we give money to agencies that help people struggling to pay their rent. But I’m afraid there are still lots of poor people.”
“Are they part of your church, and do you welcome them into your homes? I read where Jesus said that when you give a dinner that you should not invite friends or relatives but should invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind.”
You’re beginning to wish you had never given him that Bible. “There are very few poor people in my church. The poor live in other parts of town for the most part. And it’s scary to invite poor people you don’t know into your house. Look around. I have lots of nice things and poor people might steal them.”
“But I thought Jesus said you weren’t to worry about possessions, that you should give them away to help the poor,” says the increasingly perplexed alien. You wish you could start all over, but he continues. “It doesn’t sound like many Christians are giving away their possessions. I’m confused. Are you sure that Christians are people who follow Jesus?”
You sit there stunned. You don’t know how to respond. The alien’s question has rocked you to your core, and you wonder if you can answer. You know that you believe in Jesus, but you’re beginning to wonder if the alien is right. It seems that you don’t actually follow him. Worse, you know the alien can asks lots more uncomfortable questions about forgiveness, about being willing to suffer for others, about welcoming the outsider, and so on. But mercifully, he stops; then departs, still looking confused, but mostly looking sad.
This scenario came to me as I was thinking about today’s reading from Luke. I know that many people think of stories in the gospels as accounts of things that once happened and not necessarily as things affecting them directly. But in fact, Luke writes his gospel for Christians who already know the story of Jesus. He isn’t trying to tell them what happened. He’s trying to explain what it means for them. Luke writes this morning’s verses to address two matters facing Christians some 40 or 50 years after Jesus lived, died, and rose again. First, how are they to handle the inevitable fact that some will not welcome their message? And second, what is required of them if they are to be faithful witnesses to the kingdom, the new day that springs forth in Jesus?
No doubt there is some hyperbole in what Jesus says about the level of commitment required, but there’s not doubt he’s talking about serious commitment. Burying one’s father was an extremely important obligation in Jewish culture. And the part about going home to say farewell and “no one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back” is an explicit reference to the prophets Elijah and Elisha. When Elijah first called Elisha to be his successor, Elisha was plowing and was given permission to go home and say farewell. So Jesus is saying that following him requires a commitment greater than that of the prophet Elisha.
I often hear people adamantly insist that America
I recently stumbled across a sermon Martin Luther King, Jr. originally preached in his Atlanta
We shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering. We will meet your physical force with soul force. Do to us what you will and we will still love you. We cannot in all good conscience obey your unjust laws and abide by the unjust system, because non-cooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good, and so throw us in jail and we will still love you. Bomb our homes and threaten our children, and, as difficult as it is, we will still love you. Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our communities at the midnight hour and drag us out on some wayside road and leave us half-dead as you beat us, and we will still love you. Send your propaganda agents around the country, and make it appear that we are not fit, culturally and otherwise, for integration, and we'll still love you. But be assured that we'll wear you down by our capacity to suffer, and one day we will win our freedom. We will not only win freedom for ourselves; we will so appeal to your heart and conscience that we will win you in the process, and our victory will be a double victory.[1]
This seems to me just the sort of commitment Jesus demanded of his followers, and the sort of commitment that might have impressed an alien visitor. And if I and a few others lived lives that demonstrated this sort of commitment, I seriously doubt that so many people would consider the church a worn out relic of another time.
But I do not despair, and I am not without hope. According to Luke, Jesus does not condemn even those who reject him. And what is more, with the coming of the Holy Spirit, timid and frightened disciples became bold and brave, even Peter who denied knowing Jesus just to save his own skin.
Come Holy Spirit, come!
[1] Martin Luther King, Jr, “A Christmas Sermon on Peace” was first preached at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta
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