Three Radical Demands (2)

 

 

“The Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head” (Luke 9:58).

 

Those in Christ are the Body of Christ; this is not a metaphor; this is a reality. In the eternal counsels of God, the Father is to have a Family, the Son a Body and a Bride, and the Spirit a Temple. As Augustine writes, “As is the Head, so is the Body.” Jesus Christ is the Vine, we are the branches – we can do nothing in and of ourselves (John 15:1 – 5).

 

Jesus testifies that His Kingdom is not of this world (John 18:36); if His Kingdom is not of this world, then, since we are in Him and are of Him and are His Body, our Kingdom is not of this world. As Paul writes, we are citizens of Heaven (Phil. 3:20).

 

This has been the testimony of His Body throughout the ages, and this includes those who were promised the land of Canaan, that is, the Patriarchs understood that Canaan was a shadow and a type, and therefore their vision went far beyond dirt and sand and mountain and river – they lived as strangers and pilgrims, not as settlers – nor should we (Hebrews 11:8 – 16). The Patriarchs “desired a better country, that is, a heavenly one” (Heb. 11:16), they were seeking that City “which God has prepared for them” (Heb. 11:16).

 

The promise to Abraham and his seed is that we shall be “heir of the world” (Rom. 4:13; Matt. 5:5; Rev. 21:1 – 7). How tragic when we mistake the type and shadow for the reality, when we confuse the lower image for the higher substance, when we are distracted from the eternal by things which are passing away. When we propagate such thinking we can become participants and enablers of death and destruction and sorrow and pain – poisoning our own souls and the souls of others.

 

Since the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His Head, He has nowhere to lay His Body. Why, O why, do we attempt to lay the Body of Christ in holes and in nests where the Head is not to be found? Is this not grotesque? Why, O why, do we seek to separate the Head from the Body? Does this not result in death?

 

Are we not playing the part of Herod in beheading Someone greater than John the Baptist?

 

The economic systems dance for us, the political systems dance for us, the sports and entertainment systems dance for us, the worlds of education and science dance for us…and we are so engrossed in them, so impressed by them…so seduced by them…and yes…by our religions systems…that we cry, “We’ll give you whatever you want! We’ll do even better than Herod, while he would only give Herodias half of his kingdom, we’ll give you our own souls!”

 

And the guillotine drops and the Head is served from the Body…and we think nothing of it.

 

Can we see the dead bodies around us? Can we see the congregations, those local bodies, which have been severed from the Head, from Christ? This body lies in the crypt of politics and nationalism, that body in the mausoleum of economics and the pursuit of money, that body over there in religious tradition that makes the Word of God of no effect, that body yonder lies dead in the seduction of entertainment, sports, the arts.

 

Is the Head of the Body not enough for us, His Body?

 

O dear friends, Jesus plus anything is not the Gospel, it is not the Cross, it is not the narrow way and gate – any identity other than the identity of Jesus Christ and Him alone is a false identity, a seductive identity with false promises – it is the lap of Deliah in which our glory is shorn from us.

 

Jesus is clear that even as He is not of the world and its systems, so are we not of the world and its systems – for as is the Head, so is the Body (John 15:18 – 16:4; 17:13 – 19).

 

As John writes, “Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For ALL that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is NOT from the Father, but is from the world. The world is passing away, and also its lusts; but the one who does the will of God lives forever” (1 John 2:15 – 17).

 

“We know that we are of God, and that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one” (1 John 5:19).

 

The radical call of Jesus Christ is the call to follow the One who has nowhere to lay His Head in this world; just as there is no place for Him to rest in this world, for Him to find peace, for Him to trust – so there is no place in this world for us…our only place of rest and trust and peace is in Jesus Christ…not in a ballot box, not in a bank or investment account, not in possessions and pleasures, not in nationalism, not in military might…only in Jesus are we to live, only in Jesus are we to breathe, only in Jesus are we to hope, and only to Jesus are we to draw others.

 

Are we hearing the Father say, “This is My Beloved Son, hear Him!” (Matthew 17:5)?

Three Radical Demands (1)

 

“As they were going along the road, someone said to Him, ‘I will follow You wherever You go.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.’ And He said to another, ‘Follow Me.’ But he said, ‘Lord, permit me first to go and bury my father.’ But He said to him, ‘Allow the dead to bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim everywhere the kingdom of God.’

 

“Another also said, ‘I will follow You, Lord, but first permit me to say good-bye to those at home.’ But Jesus said to him, ‘No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.’” Luke 9:57 – 62.

 

Jesus confronts three people with three radical demands, and in doing so He confronts us; He confronts us as individuals, as husbands and wives, as families, as congregations.

 

He tells us that “the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head,” and in doing so He tells us that to follow Him wherever He goes means that we will have no rest in the world, no place in world to identify with, no political, economic, social, ethnic, national, or other movement in which we may rest, that we may call home – just as the Son of Man has no such place, so those who follow Him will have no such place – our identity must always and forever be in Him and only in Him.

 

In saying that the dead must bury their own dead, Jesus tells us that there are only two types of people in the world, those who have the life of God in them and those who don’t. We are to go and proclaim the Gospel so that those who are dead may live. There are those who are burying the dead, and then there are those who are proclaiming Jesus so that the dead may rise – both in this age and in the ages to come.

 

In saying that no one after putting his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God, Jesus reinforces His call to discipleship in Luke 9:23 – 26; we are to take up our cross daily, losing our lives for His sake and the Gospel, denying ourselves and proclaiming Jesus and the Gospel.

 

While these teachings of Jesus may seem radical to us, they represent normative Biblical discipleship – that is, they represent what ought to be the norm in our lives and in our churches. Are they the norm? Do we hear this call to discipleship on Sunday mornings? Over media? In daily conversation? Do our books and other writings reflect this call? Do our small groups meet within the context of this call?

 

We may have the “right” doctrine and beliefs, but if our lives are not “right” in following Jesus Christ, if they are not conforming to His call, then do we not have what James styles “faith without works, which are dead”?

 

Well, to be sure Luke 9:57 – 62 is a challenge, a sobering challenge, a reality check.

 

How does the passage challenge you? What questions do you have about it? What does it look like in your life? What does it look like in your congregation? In your friendships? In your family?

 

To be continued…

Tossed – Where Will We Land?

 

 

“His winnowing fork is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clear His threshing floor; and He will gather His wheat into the barn, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire” (Matthew 3:12).

 

The wheat and the chaff are tossed into the air together and are separated by the wind. The wind carries the chaff away while the wheat falls to the ground and is gathered into the barn. The wheat is thrown into the air just as the chaff, but then the separation – the chaff is carried away.

 

We ought not to think it strange that we share in the human experience, after all, we are human…though we are now human in Christ. The question isn’t so much about what we experience, but rather how we experience it. Do we experience tossing as chaff or as wheat? The chaff is blown away, the wheat remains.

 

God says that He will shake all things, so that those things which cannot be shaken may remain (Hebrews 12:26 – 29). We are all tossed, we are all shaken. We cannot avoid being tossed or shaken, the question is whether we will remain – and remain we most certainly will if we are in Jesus Christ.

 

When we are tossed and shaken our Father will reveal things within us that need to be removed, and He will affirm things within us which we ought to nurture in Christ. Tossing and shaking are opportunities to be transformed into the image of Jesus Christ – opportunities which we ought not to waste.

 

We cannot permanently insulate ourselves from the suffering common to humanity, sooner or later it will touch us, sooner or later we will face our frailty, sooner or later we will come to the end of ourselves – is it not better to experience this within Christ than to deceive ourselves that we are in control of life? In Christ we can know the security of His embrace, in Christ we can sense His heartbeat for us…outside of Christ we only have a freefall into the abyss.

 

John’s message is that Jesus has a winnowing fork and is throwing the wheat and the chaff into the air; when Jesus comes into our lives, into our communities, into our churches, He comes with a winnowing fork, He comes to upset us, He comes to toss us up into the air, He picks us up from our comfortable pews and tosses us up, up, up into the air…and then the wind comes…and the wind blows…and the chaff is gone…while the wheat falls back to the ground to be picked up and brought into the barn by Jesus.

 

Throughout the Gospels Jesus carries a winnowing fork; He carries it into synagogues, He carries it into the Temple in Jerusalem, He carries it by the Sea of Galilee, He carries it in the Decapolis, He carries it before Annas and Caiaphas, He carries it before Pilate and Herod, and He carries it into our lives.

 

Let us not be surprised when we are tossed into the air by the winnowing fork of Jesus; instead, let us be faithful to Him.