Three Radical Demands (3)

 

“Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim everywhere the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:60).

 

The request, “Lord, permit me first to go and bury my father,” seems reasonable. Is this not a duty of a child, to ensure that a parent has a proper burial? What kind of son would leave his parent unburied? What child would not be with his or her family at the funeral of a father or mother, sharing their grief and giving comfort?

 

Yet Jesus says, “Let the dead bury the dead.”

 

Why would anyone follow Jesus after hearing these words?

 

“But as for you, go and proclaim everywhere the kingdom of God.”

 

Not only is this person not to bury his father, but he is to go and proclaim Good News. This man doesn’t get a day or two or a week to grieve, to work through his sorrow – he is to go and proclaim the kingdom of God.

 

What will his neighbors think? His family?

 

“Where is Isaac? Why isn’t he here to bury his father, to grieve with us?”

 

“Isaac is out telling people about Jesus and the kingdom of God.”

 

“Really? What kind of man is this Jesus, that He would not want His disciple to bury his father? What kind of rabbi is this Jesus, not to tell his follower to have his priorities straight? Doesn’t Moses command us to honor our father and mother? Is not Isaac’s failure to bury his father a breaking of this commandment?”

 

Could it be that Jesus’ idea of family is not our idea of family?

 

“A crowd was sitting around Him, and they said to Him, ‘Behold, Your mother and Your brothers are outside looking for You.’ Answering them, He said, ‘Who are My mother and My brothers?’ Looking about at those who were sitting around Him, He said, ‘Behold My mother and My brothers! For whoever does the will of God, he is My brother and sister and mother.’”

 

Then we have Matthew 10:34 – 39:

 

“Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s enemies will be the members of his household. He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it.”

 

And then Luke 21:16 – 17, “But you will be betrayed even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death, and you will be hated by all because of My name.”

 

See also Luke 18:28 – 30.

 

As we ponder these passages, one thing we must not do is water them down, we must not blunt the sword or dull the scalpel – we must submit to them and allow the Word of God to do its work within us. It is far better to say, “I just don’t understand this,” and spend a lifetime working through what Jesus says, than to make the Word of Jesus mush, gruel that can’t be eaten, or cotton candy that will rot our teeth.  

 

These passages are a matter of the heart. The mind will explain the passages away, the heart will have to wrestle with them, to submit to them, to cry, “Not my will, but Your will be done!”

 

It would not surprise me if we never have closure on these passages; we may pretend to have closure, we may pretend that we fully understand and embrace them, but I really wonder if we can ever finish the wrestling match. Our tendency is to explain them away, to superimpose our commonsense interpretations, to lessen their challenge and bite, to avoid them – after all, they are not attractive, they are not winsome, they are not calculated to win friends and influence people.

 

Somewhere Oswald Chambers wrote that we often tell God that He does not know what our obedience will cost others, that He does not know what our obedience will cost our family and friends. Do we not tell God that we must wait for a better time to obey His call of the Cross? Do we not tell God that since others will not understand, that we must either wait or must modify His Word of obedience to us? Do we not edit the Word of God so that it is palatable to us and do we not make the Word conform to us, rather than conform our lives to the Word? Do we not insist that the Bible submit to us, rather than submit ourselves to the Bible?

 

How do these passages challenge you?

 

We’ll return to this in our next reflection in the series, the Lord willing…