Loving God, you call us into a relationship with you that is both life-giving and costly.  Grant us the eyes to see the depth of your love for us and hearts that are ready to respond; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

    How important is your relationship with God?  How important is it to you that the Creator of the Universe desires to be reconciled with you?  How important is it to you that you are able to be at one with God through Jesus Christ?

    From God’s perspective, this relationship is extremely important – so much so, in fact, that it was worth the death of God’s Son.  God’s word to us is this: “I have loved you with an everlasting love” (Jer. 31:3b).  “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life” (Jn. 3:16).  God has acted to reconcile us to God’s self through Jesus Christ, and God has done so in love.

    For our part, God created us with the ability to make choices.  God is not looking for people who have been forced into worshiping God.  God is also not looking for people who just go through the motions while they’re thinking about something else.  Rather, God is looking for those who are aware of all that they have received from God’s hand and who freely respond to God’s grace out of love.

    However, as today’s gospel makes clear, a life-giving relationship with God through Jesus Christ does not just develop all on its own.  Any relationship takes some work in order for it to be a good relationship.  At the same time, we don’t just automatically learn how to live in Christ.  When we believe in Jesus, it involves more than just saying that we believe.  Being a Christian involves a certain way of being, and a certain way of living, and a certain way of doing things differently than the world around us.  And we simply do not learn how to follow Jesus when everything else is more important than our relationship with God.

    And so, we are being asked to think very carefully about our priorities today, as well as about how we all make sacrifices for the things that are important to us.  Those of you who are parents, or even grandparents, are well acquainted with making sacrifices on behalf of your children or grandchildren.  When it’s important to you that your child play a certain sport or learn a musical instrument or learn how to dance, you make sacrifices both of time and money in order to make those things happen.  When it’s important to you that your child learns how to worship or gets to know Jesus or participates in Sunday school, you make sacrifices in order to make that happen as well.

    Most of us are also well acquainted with the idea of counting the cost.  Before you sign up your child for a competitive hockey team or soccer team that’s going to be traveling around going to tournaments, you count the cost – not just the money, but the time that you will be asked to invest as a parent.  In the same way, if you’re considering taking a new job where you will be working every weekend for the first year, wouldn’t you be asking yourself if this job is worth it?  We count the cost all the time, and make sacrifices when we feel that something is important.  So how important is your relationship with God?

    A little survey for you: How many of you believe in Jesus Christ and trust him as your Lord and Saviour?  And how many of you hate your father and mother and sisters and brothers and spouse and children?  And how many of you have given up all your possessions?  And how many of you are eager to try out crucifixion for yourselves? [Your responses are about what I would have guessed.] So does that mean that you don’t believe the Bible? [responses]

    Today’s gospel is one of those passages that argues against the approach to the Bible that says, “It means exactly what it says and that’s it!”  When Jesus was teaching people, he used a lot of different techniques, including telling stories (or parables) and something called hyperbole (or overstatement).  Hyperbole is used to get people’s attention, just as the parables often have something shocking in them.  And so, it is important to be aware of what it is that we are reading, as well as the context in which it was written.

    In this case, Luke tells us that there were large crowds of people who were following Jesus around.  Jesus, it seems, wants to make sure that they are following him for the right reasons.  Do they really know what they are getting themselves into?  And so he tells them that if they really want to follow him and learn from him (for that’s what disciple means), they will need to hate their closest family members.

    In this case, we know that Jesus is using hyperbole because of the rest of the Scriptures.  Love is central in Jesus’ teaching, and not hate, and as Christians we are to love even our enemies (Mt. 5:44).  However, there is a stern warning in this gospel passage.  Believing in Jesus might well put you at odds with your closest family members, as many first century Jewish families found out.

    In the same way, not all those who believe in Jesus end up getting crucified.  However, there were certainly some of Jesus’ followers who met this fate, and others who were tortured and put to death in the Roman coliseum.  And so Jesus is asking all those who would follow him, “Are you willing to put your life on the line for your faith?”

    And then there’s the matter of giving up all your possessions.  There are some people who absolutely need to do this, for their possessions have become a burden and a curse and draw them away from God.  Throughout history, there are many examples of Christians who have done this, including people like St. Francis of Assissi.  In the early church, too, people sold what they had in order to be able to look after those among them who were poor.

    And so, Jesus is essentially saying, “When you follow me, you will learn to discern what you really need and what you don’t.  When you follow me, you will learn to trust God rather than trusting in the abundance of your possessions.  There is so much that you can do to share the wealth with others.  In the kingdom of God, you don’t need so much stuff!”

    Today, we are asked to count the cost and to ask ourselves about our priorities.  Do we want to be at one with God, growing day by day into a life-giving relationship with God through Jesus Christ?  As David Lose observes (who is a professor at Luther Seminary in MN), “like anything else worth doing, discipleship takes time, energy, work, and practice – in a word, it takes sacrifice” (workingpreacher.org).  And so, why would you want to follow Jesus and learn from him (which is discipleship)?

    Perhaps because in Jesus we find life in all its fulness, the peace that passes understanding, and a life-giving and eternal relationship with God.  Thanks be to God!  Amen.

Lectionary 23(C)                                Luke 14:25-33
September 8, 2013
St. Luke’s Zion Lutheran Church
Pastor Lynne Hutchison

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