Scripture: Psalm 139; Luke 14:25-33
"Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children,
brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple"
- Luke 14:26
Jesus' numbers have been going up. Just look at the size of the crowds! He's become a
major tourist attraction. You can't argue with numbers. Like a television evangelist
attracting millions and raking in millions, Jesus must be doing something right.
He'd started out so small and insignificant. Born in Bethlehem, a two-bit town off the
beaten path, raised then rejected in Nazareth by his own people after he gave his first
sermon and no formal education, it's nice to see his career taking off. Look at the
crowds! You can't argue with numbers. Today the head usher will count the numbers. Pretty
good crowd. I wonder how it compares with last year? How about with 1950?
Jesus rises to speak. The microphone is turned on and the crowd quiets down. He says,
"Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers
and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. Take up your cross and
follow me."
The crowd gasps. Then there is stunned silence. Hate father, mother, brothers, sisters,
your own life? Is this the Jesus who said, "Love your neighbor as yourself?"
There are no more shocking words of Jesus than these. They seem to condemn everything we
hold dear: our families, our children, our parents, our life.
"Count the cost," says Jesus. Before you launch a building project, you
better pencil the numbers and check the bank account. "Count the cost." If
you're a king about to go into battle, count the cost. No king goes to war without first
calculating if there are a enough soldiers to win.
"Therefore," Jesus says, "If you want to follow me, and see it on
through to the end, then you better count the cost. For if, you cannot give up everything,
then you cannot be my disciple."
"Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother . . . cannot be my
disciple."
Bible scholars tell us that the word "hate" is Semitic hyperbole: an
exaggeration. The word does not mean screaming, damaging hate like in a vicious argument,
but "detachment"or "turning away from." So we don't have to hate, we
just have to give up our families, our possessions, and our lives. Whew! That's a relief!
Crowds followed Jesus. Everywhere he went, they wanted to get a piece of him, to be
with him, to be healed by him, to be taken up and loved by him, like a little kid crawling
into her daddy's lap.
Then Jesus turned on them and said, "Count the cost. If you follow me, you will go
places that you never imagined you would go. You will be torn up inside and there will be
great conflict between and among those whom you love. Count the cost."
Elsewhere in scripture, a man comes up to Jesus and says, "I will follow you
wherever you go." Jesus rebukes the man saying, "Foxes have holes, and birds
have nests, but the Son of Man has no where to lay his head." "Count the
cost."
Jesus' numbers are going down. What happened to the crowds? Jesus journeys down the
road toward Jerusalem, toward his destiny and the crowds become smaller. The admirers fall
away. The courageous get cold feet, butterflies and dry mouths until on a dark Thursday
night when Caesar's soldiers come to take him away. We all flee. "Count the
cost."
This is the hour when Martin Luther said, "Here I stand, I can do no other."
This is the hour when Dr. King said, "Stand up for righteousness. Stand up for
truth." This is the hour when Father Daniel Berrigan said as he was being led to
prison to begin his sentence for resistance to the Vietnam War, "If you follow Jesus,
you'd better look good on wood."
This faith of ours is costly. We travel down paths where we do not know the ending. We
commit ourselves to a Lord who will take us down roads whose destiny is rarely clear. All
of us have lived long enough to have intimations of the cost of courageous discipleship.
We have faced enough heartache to know. We have faced enough difficult moral choices to
know. We have encountered enough of our own fear to know that the costs are high, the road
narrow and the crowd small.
No lover of justice has not known fear. No lover of compassion has not hurt profoundly
in the face of another's pain. No lover of peace has not known the pervasiveness of human
evil. "Count the cost."
I do not know why each of you are here this morning. You may be here for the music or
the bounce house. You may be here for the beautiful stained glass window or to meet nice
people. You may be here to think high thoughts or even get a practical suggestion for
tomorrow's living. These are all very good reasons to go to church and I commend you for
them. Jesus may not get to you at this hour and you can go home and rest tonight in your
bed and sleep peacefully.
But if you happen to be here today, because you carry a cross, and you want to follow
him, to love him, to know him; if you are here today, because you carry a cross that you
cannot lift yourself: a cross of heartache, a cross of loneliness, a cross of broken
relationship; if you are here today because you carry a cross because of your accent or
the color of your skin, if you brought a cross because you have been persecuted or
excluded or damaged by another, or a cross where you have done damage to another, then
bring that cross in here.
Or if you happen to be here today because you carry a cross, a burden, a calling, a
cause: a conviction that every child should be cherished, a conviction that every old
person should be valued, if you come here today because you are worried about your
children and the world in which they are being raised, and the values that they are not
being taught and you want to change that, then bring that cross in here as well. This is
where you belong.
If you are here today carrying a cross that the church of Jesus Christ should be a
place of inclusion and hospitality, but you know that it isn't, then bring that cross in
here and lay it down and give it to Jesus.
I do not know your cross. I do not know the cross that you dragged in here with you
this morning; I do not know the cross that you left outside the door because you thought
it was too ugly or too shameful or too embarrassing or the cause too difficult to bring
inside into this beautiful sanctuary and to share with all these nicely dressed people. I
don't know, but you know and God knows.
But I do know this. To all who receive Christ, to all who commit their lives to him, to
all who he asks to renounce everything and follow, he gives new life.
In here the lame walk, the broken are healed, the excluded find hospitality, the
addicted find a higher power, the aged and children alike join hands, skin color of every
hue and shade is declared beautiful and the good news of Jesus Christ crucified and raised
for you and for me is proclaimed, and taught and practiced.
"Count the cost." The perils are great and the benefits are beyond
imagination. "Come follow me," says Jesus. Through the grace and the power and
the presence of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
