Grace to you and peace…from God who creates and connects us, from Jesus who invites and re-connects us, and from the Holy Spirit who challenges and dis-connects us from all that would knock us out of sync with our Triune God. AMEN.
“Truly I tell you, whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, brother and sister, yes even life itself cannot be my disciple,” Jesus says. Yikes!
Let’s get a word out there, that I think might distract us from what Jesus is really trying to say here: “hate”.
Scholar Gene Peterson translates it “refuses to let go of.” I would put it like this: If anything or anyone is stopping you from being a follower of Jesus—not just a believer or an admirer or a lover of Jesus, but a follower—then we’re called to “reject those relationships, those things, those people as NOT life-giving, not resurrection affirming, not Gospel-centric, justice-seeking, unconditional-love-sharing...” We care called today to let go of all those things and people, just like we reject “sin and the devil, all the forces that defy God,” as we say in baptism. In other words, if your relationships, your possessions, your daily habits are preventing you from living more fully into that person that God is calling you to be (in Luke = that means part of a faithful community actively practicing mercy and justice), then let the Holy Spirit sever those ties!
Hear this on many levels; it is not simple. We are engaged in all kinds of relationships — some with aging and increasingly debilitated parents, some with spouses who are terminally ill, some brothers who drain our resources in their seemingly endless battles with addictions. Friends that are good and so called “Facebook friends” — that are kind to your face and online, but they’ won’t show up when the going gets tough... Maybe, God forbid, they’d even speak ill of you behind your back. Think of all the relationships you’re in. I’m just naming a few examples…
I wonder if you’ve got members in your own family who are deeply hurtful and cruel to you even though they say they love you? Are we to sever those ties?
I think the question is, “Are those relationships life giving? Is that relationship what you believe God is calling you to stay in? If not, are you able to name it as harmful?”
I heard an NPR interview about a year ago, where a neuroscientist was promoting her new book, about severing ties with family, citing brain research—that the brains of people who were victims of serious and/or chronic emotional and psychological abuse actually had brain damage, destroyed neural pathways and loss of brain cells. Abuse causes brain damage! So this scientist was actually promoting the severing of ties with one’s toxic sources, over and against endless attempts to reconcile and accommodate. Very thought-provoking.
I’m not saying this is Jesus’ call playing out in modern science, but I do think it challenges us to imagine who and what are our “toxic sources.” And might we simply name them as such? Can we at least say, this person or this habit or this thing is not life-giving, it’s not orienting me in the direction of God’s call for me, it’s preventing me from picking up the cross and following Jesus, and so I’m going to sever ties with it, with him, with her. I’m going to let go of that toxicity...
That’s interesting because it’s not unheard-of for people, particularly pastors/priests to name those “toxic sources” precisely as “one’s cross to bear.” There are cases — and I pray that you’re not one of them, but I know people who have experienced this: a pastor/priest has told women I’ve known who are being abused by their husbands, “Well, we all have our crosses to bear, let me pray for you as you bear yours.” Bearing a cross has nothing to do with being abused or surviving a toxic relationship.
Bearing a cross is what happens when we are able to put down those things – and that might just mean to name them as not life-giving (stop rationalizing or justifying or sugar-coating or making excuses, just call them what they are: toxic) – and then, choose instead pick up, to ingest what Christ is offering here. The cross of discipleship. We can do this, by the way, only with the help of God and with our community of faith, but we can do this, from all kinds of places…
See, I’m not just talking about dropping everything and everyone and suddenly, jumping into all kinds of radical global outreach efforts (of course, that would be good...but not sure how many are going to fly to the Bahamas today to help out) – but friends, we can pick our crosses and follow Jesus in all kinds of ways and from all kinds of places: even as we are homebound, bed-ridden, locked up in prison, or in a hospital: How? We can pray fervently for the needs of the world, urge forgiveness and mercy, like Paul did with Philemon. Paul was in prison, bearing a cross! We can speak words or write letters of encouragement (Val yesterday).
What if you got a letter from one of our homebound members, just greeting you lovingly and encouraging you to forgive someone who’s wronged you? What a gift, someone picked up their cross and you were the recipient of their faithfulness to Christ!
Friends, we can pick up our crosses and follow Jesus, even as our family or professional lives are stretched in every direction. Name the toxic thing for what it is, offer it up, maybe give it up – but at least name it – and then pray for God to take you and mold you anew.
God today invites us, in fact demands of us (in Lukan Jesus’ characteristic sharp way), wholeness and authenticity (which means suffering, cross-bearing), and not everybody is willing to go there. A large crowd was following Jesus, and he wasn’t exactly thrilled with this. Jesus didn’t want big numbers; he wanted people who were serious followers, willing to lay down their lives for the Gospel. In short, and in the parlance of our times, Jesus is asking, “ARE YOU FOR REAL?”
And we say, “Yes, Lord.” (Will you pray with me?)
“We say yes, Lord, to your call to discipleship, but we need your help. The way of the cross is frightening. It means sacrificing. And changing. Starting over. And severing some ties. And forgiving. That’s some robust activity, God. And we’ve got a lot of baggage, some that’s just distracting us, and some that actually holding us back from being your disciples to our fullest potential. Help us God. Help us shed our baggage, help us sever our ties with all that is harmful to ourselves and to your mission.
“And thank you for making our wellness a part of your mission. Thank you for valuing our bodies and our minds. Thank you for valuing our life. Thank you for marking us with your cross, calling us your children. And help us to spread your Good News to others. Help us to share and be humble. Give us direction and clarity of vision. AMEN.”
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