Dr. William A. Ritter
First United Methodist Church, Birmingham, Michigan
Scripture: Luke 14:25-33
Since the road we call “Lent” ends in Jerusalem….and since what comes to an end in Jerusalem is far more bloody than it is pretty….this is buckle-up-the-boots-and-get-serious-about-the-journey time, especially if it’s the “Jesus Road” we’re traveling. Which may explain the harsh tone of the speech here.
Our text begins with the observation that there are “great multitudes following Jesus.” How many is that? You tell me. I mean, the Bible doesn’t tell me. So your word is pretty much as good as anybody’s.
Certainly, “great multitudes” means “more than a few.” And not all of them, equally committed. Some are signed for the duration. Others are merely joyriding. There’s a world of difference between the consecrated and the curious. Get a group of people surging down Maple Road and I’d go two or three blocks with anybody (just to find out what was going on). But I don’t know how much further I’d go if someone turned around, stared me down, and said: “If anyone follows me and does not hate his own mother and father, wife and children, brothers and sisters, he cannot be my disciple.” No, I don’t know how much further I’d go after a speech like that.
Those would be fighting words to me. To you too, I suppose. And assuming Jesus uttered them, they must have been fighting words to those who heard them then. Meaning that they didn’t rest easy on the ear. For while Matthew and Luke got them from the same source, Matthew (who never softened anything) softened them….taking out the words “he who does not hate” and substituting “he who loves father and mother more than me.” But most everybody agrees that Luke’s rendering is primary while Matthew’s is secondary….meaning that “hate” is the word Luke wanted and “hate” is the word Luke used. If you’ve got a Bible with a watered-down translation, chances are pretty good that your version is wrong. Less offensive, maybe. More palatable, to be sure. But still wrong. “You want to follow me,” said Jesus, “you’d better be prepared to hate family.”
I don’t like hearing that. I don’t like saying that. Nobody else likes it much, either. Even the scholars who translated it correctly, apologized for it profusely. William Barclay (who is right more often than most) says: “We must not take the words of Jesus with cold and unimaginative literalness. Eastern language is always as vivid as the human mind can make it. When Jesus tells us to hate our nearest and dearest, he does mean that literally. He means that no other love in life can compare with the love we give to him.”
While George Buttrick says: “The word ‘hate’ repels. It is a staggering word, but it was intended to stagger. The word means that we are to act ‘as if’ we hate our loved ones whenever the claims of home come into conflict with the claims of Jesus.” I take that to mean that if you are convinced Jesus is calling you into ministry while your daddy is calling you into dentistry, you’ve got conflicting claims between home and Jesus.
To which Joseph Fitzmyer (Luke’s primary translator) says: “In most cases, the love of Jesus and the love of parents are not likely to be incompatible….and to hate one’s parents, as such, would be monstrous. But Christ’s followers must be ready, if necessary, to act toward those dearest to them as if they were objects of hatred.”
You see, even those who know the text best, dance around it most. Not just because they hate the word “hate,” but because they love the word “family.” As do we all. I can’t imagine a more cherished institution than the family. People get elected to public office on pro-family platforms. Churches have Family Night suppers and build Family Life Centers (bigger, in square footage, than their sanctuaries). And while few of us are violent by nature, most of us would become so, were it necessary to protect our family. Blood is thick. We’ll fight family. We’ll even hurt family. Until someone else tries to fight or hurt family. Then we’ll fight them. I once heard somebody say: “I can say that to my brother, but you can’t say that to my brother. Them’s fighting words.”
But it is also true that just as the family is the source of our greatest blessing, the family is (sometimes) the source of our greatest damage. Most psychiatrists will tell you that. So will veteran preachers who have been around long enough to hear the horror stories of the really dysfunctional families and have fallen to their knees, not only to pray, but to help sweep up the pieces. I have heard it said….especially in communities like this one….that there are families who give too much. And I have also heard it said….especially in communities like this one….that there are families who ask too much. William Willimon (Duke University) writes:
I have decided, since coming to the university and working with young people, that one of the greatest gifts a parent can give a child is the reassurance that all of the parent’s hopes, dreams and aspirations are not resting upon that child. Whenever the parent complains to the child that “I gave you…. (therefore) you owe me,” that family has failed. And one of the greatest gifts children can give parents (if and when they grow up) is the reassurance that their development is not totally dependent on the competency (or blamelessness) of the parents.
Still, for reasons that often take years (at the rate of $135 per hour) to unravel, not everybody who starts in a family, finishes in a family. Nor does everyone who craves one, get one. Like the eunuch that Phillip meets in Acts 8:26-40. He is Ethiopian, African and sexless….cut off (literally) from any possibility of children, and from any possible place in the temple. For in Deuteronomy 23:1, we read that “a eunuch shall not enter the assembly of the Lord.” Which means that there will be no family for him, biologically or ecclesiastically. He has been to Jerusalem. But Jerusalem would not let him in. Leading me to wonder what it’s like, when you knock on the doors of Mother Church, and even Mother Church says(however quietly): “No, no, no, no.”
But Phillip meets him in the desert, where he is sitting in his chariot reading a scroll. And somewhere in the conversation, Phillip makes a connection for the Ethiopian between the words he is reading and the Word who is Jesus. Leading the Ethiopian to request baptism. And leading Phillip to mutter: “They were upset in Jerusalem when I baptized those Samaritans. They’re probably gonna kill me for this.”
Well, baptism was a moot point, given that they were in a desert. And where are you going to find water in a desert? Which was when the eunuch said: “Look, here is water.” And right there in the desert, a white man baptized a black man….a Jew baptized an Ethiopian….and a follower of Jesus baptized a eunuch. Who, through baptism, found a new family. What’s the point? Try this. Maybe at the end of the day….or even in the heat of the day….water (baptismal water) is thicker than blood. And could it be….I mean, could it possibly be….that this was what Jesus was getting at on the road, when he said something like: “You know, if you’re going to follow me, the day may come when some hard decisions have to be made about which family takes priority.”
But, as if that isn’t hard enough, we plunge straight into this advisory about cost accounting: “Don’t start what you can’t finish.” Tally up the task….the demands of it….the duration of it….your passion for it.…your commitment to it….the resources you bring to it. And then ask, can you do it….clean through to the end of it?
Then Jesus gives not one example, but two. The first concerns a man whose plan it was to build a tower. But he came up short. Either he lacked bricks….money to buy bricks….talent to lay bricks….or a ladder to lift bricks. So that when he was done, all he had was a tower base but no elevation. And everybody laughed at him, saying: “Did you ever see such a stupid man?”
Or what of a king, said Jesus, who declared war on a rival king, only to discover (after a season of saber rattling) that the rival king had two swordsmen for every one of his. Wouldn’t he hurry to the peace table rather than blunder into a bloodbath?
Well, that makes sense. At least it rings true with my experience. “Son, don’t start what you can’t finish,” my father said (concerning a task he was about to lay before me). “Ritter, don’t start what you can’t finish,” Charlie Robertson said (that day outside the paper station) concerning a whipping he was about to lay on me.
Planning is good. Careful planning is better. When Tony Shipley was my district superintendent, every piece of letterhead that came out of the district office said: “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” Which made sense.
Before coming here, I worked on a pair of building campaigns with professional fundraisers. Following one of those campaigns, they actually turned around and offered me a job. Obviously, I didn’t take it. But I thought about it.
As you can well imagine, professional fundraisers don’t come cheap. And I’ve yet to meet a church board or finance committee that didn’t balk at paying the cost. I can hear the refrain today: “Why should we give these people thousands of dollars that could be put to better use in the building?” But the selling point that turned things in the fundraiser’s favor was the information that professionals, hired from the outside, meet their goal in 95 percent of the churches they serve.
Which is true. But not for the reasons you might think. Their success has more to do with cost accounting than creative marketing. That’s because they never let you set a goal you can’t reach. And they have sophisticated, time-tested formulas for determining what that base number is. I know a lot of those formulas. I won’t go into them here. But my point is that their success has more to do with their prior calculation of a church’s capability than with the merits of the case, the tenor of the times or the generosity of the membership. They reach what they go after because they won’t let you go after more than you can get.
Jesus said: “Don’t start out on a journey you can’t complete.” Don’t put yourself in a position where people are going to laugh at you. Or ridicule you. In other words, don’t enlist impulsively.
Which sounds like my father. Which sounds like my district superintendent. Which sounds like my fundraiser friends. But which, I am sorry, does not sound like Jesus. In virtually every encounter Jesus has with people, he seems to invite followers, right then and there. I seldom hear him say:
· Why don’t you go home and think about it?
· Why don’t you talk it over with several of your friends?
· Why not take these papers and have your attorney finesse the fine print?
· Why not give it a year and let it sink in?
· Why not proceed cautiously, lest your present enthusiasm cloud your judgment?
No, I don’t hear that from the lips of Jesus. Instead, he calls disciples who “straightaway” leave their nets and follow. Then he adds words about not looking over your shoulder….not going back to settle affairs….and, for God’s sake, not even going back home to bury the dead. The message seems to be: “Do it now, while the spirit is on you, or while the Spirit is in you.” In the making of Christians, there is something to be said for study and reflection. But there is something even greater to be said for passion and urgency. Neither Jesus nor the church has, as its primary message: “Hey, take your time, we’ll be here when you get it all figured out.” We will. But that’s not our primary message. Instead, we say: “Every journey starts with a first step. And you will never get it figured out until you take a first step.”
No, I can’t see Jesus raising the yellow flag of caution. Can’t see it at all. So what is all this business about, anyway?
Well, I’ve been helped by a quartet of commentators here (especially Joseph Parker and William Barclay). But most especially by Ernest Campbell who asks:
Could it be that the underlying concern is not with our ability to finish the job, but with God’s? It would appear that Jesus is saying: “You wouldn’t start a tower you couldn't finish. You wouldn’t wage a war you couldn’t win. Of course you wouldn’t. Well, neither would God. God has the plans to win….the stuff to win….the will to win….and God will win.”
Jesus preached a Kingdom that is obtainable here (in part) and attainable eventually (in full). As for the Kingdom, it’s both here and coming, he said. Then he added (in effect): “And when my time on earth is finished, the cause will go on. Don’t sweat it.” To which Campbell adds:
God has not vacated. God is not dead. God did not enter the fray in order to settle for a tie with evil. God has the means to win. And God means to win. There will be no unfinished towers in the annals of the kingdom. Neither will there be any unwon war chargeable to God. Let’s not waste even one more box of Kleenex on the Almighty. Of the many things God asks from us in scripture….our loyalty and our love….our prayers and our trust….our obedience and our faithfulness….there is not even one place in the Old or New Testament where God asks our pity.
So, to whatever degree you may possess a cost accountant’s mentality….adding up pluses and minuses….credits and debits….assets and liabilities….go versus stay….stand versus sit…. follow versus fall back….the one thing you need to factor in is not whether you are able (in spite ofyour love for the hymn of the same name), but whether God is able.
To which the burden of this passage….and of my preaching….is to suggest that the answer is a resounding “Yes.” To be sure, I could save this dosage of theological adrenaline for Easter Sunday. But given the sorry state of our national confidence, if I don’t give you a shot of it now, you may not be anywhere near Jerusalem and the empty tomb by March 28.
Thirty-three years ago, on or about July 20 (but who’s counting?), they said to me: “Come on up and preach in Paradise.” I went. It wasn’t. Haven’t been back since. But I know there’s a road that goes there.
So, too, with the Kingdom of God. Long road. Hard road. Pothole-filled road. But if my map’s correct….and I truly believe it is….it’s paved all the way.
Note: I am indebted to several persons for the development of this sermon. Will Willimon offered a most fruitful discussion of Acts 8:26-40 (Phillip and the Ethiopian eunuch) in his book, Peculiar Speech: Preaching to the Baptized. Ernest Campbell turned the Luke passage on its head for me in a book entitled Locked in a Room with Open Doors. William Barclay offered his helpful commentary in the series of books attributed to his name, while George Buttrick and Joseph Fitzmyer shared their insights in commentaries on Luke in the Interpreter’s Bible and Anchor Bible Series, respectively.
