discipleship

Choose Life

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Deuteronomy 30:15-20; Luke 14:25-33

This passage in Luke 14 begins with Jesus delivering a seriously troubling description of discipleship. “Hate your family” and “Carry your cross”? Yikes. Before you run for the hills, remember that this is the same Jesus who said, “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10:10). Who sat down to dinner with people that the religious show-offs thought were unsavory. Who welcomed outcasts, healed the sick; who said loving your neighbor was more important than anything else, which would include your neighbor who’s a family member. Somehow, this passage must be consistent with that Jesus.

We need to figure out what “carry your cross” means before we can make sense of “Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:27). Do you assume that maybe there’s one “correct” answer? Were you taught growing up, or maybe you absorbed it in a long life of singing old hymns, that the cross has something to do with suffering and forgiveness of sins? Have you ever wondered what the cross meant for Luke? For Matthew? For Mark or John? For Paul? The New Testament doesn’t have a uniform answer to that question. There is no one correct biblical answer.; it’s a conversation.

What Luke brings to that conversation is an exceptional concern for the poor and marginalized, and a tender heart for the outcast and the forsaken. So, for Luke, “carry your cross” could mean to carry the ministry of Jesus forward by seeing those whom the world overlooks. It could mean favoring the marginalized, even when it might lead to your own discomfort.

In my NRSV version of the Bible, the bold heading before this passage is “The Cost of Discipleship.” But is it really a cost? Or is it a choice? The verses from Deuteronomy come from a long speech Moses delivers to the people Israel after giving them the law, part of the covenant between God and God’s people. Moses explains that they have in front of them two paths: life and prosperity, or death and adversity. If they choose the path of following God’s law, treating each other fairly, welcoming the stranger and caring for the needy, and loving your neighbor as yourself (Leviticus 19:18), then the people will thrive. Imagine, for a moment, a society that makes that choice; imagine a society that chooses kindness, fairness, civility, and generosity. It’s true that the Hebrew Scriptures also include some ancient Middle Eastern rules that are odd or even repugnant to us today. But Jesus pointed out that what it all boils down to is “Love God and love your neighbor as yourself. Do this and live,” he said (Luke 10:28). So, Moses says that if the people choose a different path, a path of ignoring these basic rules of human fairness and kindness, they will perish. “Perish” might sound like a threat of divine punishment, but it’s just logical consequences. If you don’t live in harmony and fairness with the people you encounter, the consequence is discord, enmity, strife, and violence. If you don’t care for the needy, you’ll find yourself hunkering down to protect your stuff because you’re afraid someone will try to take it from you. If you don’t take care of the earth that is our home, it won’t take care of us. Consequences. God says, “I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live.”

Choose life. If we think of our faith as being primarily about what it costs, about what we give up, what we sacrifice, then we’re forgetting that life – all of life – is full of choices that cost us. We’re limited beings and very often when we choose one path it means we have to give up another path. Parenthood, marriage, careers, education – anything that takes commitment and effort has a cost. But that isn’t why we choose them, is it? Even when we know our choice will impact our lives in huge and unforeseen ways, even when we know there will be a “cost,” what we’re more likely to feel when we take the job, embark on the marriage, or extend ourselves in generosity is joy and gratitude, a sense of rightness, or in Christian terms, a sense of calling.

That is what the cross means here in Luke. One commentator writes, “The cross is not unique but representative of what life is. To carry your cross is to carry the choices and burdens and realities of a life that has made a certain commitment – a commitment to a way of life that is committed to bringing about the Kingdom of God here and now. That’s certainly what it meant for Jesus.”

What about the hating your family thing? Is Jesus ignoring “Honor thy father and thy mother,” one of the Ten Commandments (Deuteronomy 5:16, Exodus 20:12)? I’ve known a number of people who had to choose between a relationship with a family member and their own integrity or well-being. For Luke’s audience, following Jesus would have put family relationships at risk. And so even here, Jesus is saying, choose life; choose what will bring life, wholeness, shalom, to you and to the whole world.

What a different way of being it is if we think of the cross as a way of choosing life, rather than fixating on death. This isn’t to say Jesus’ death doesn’t matter. It’s encourages a conversation about why it matters. Maybe it matters for Luke because the cross was Jesus standing up to empire, resisting the powers that dominate, oppress, and enslave.

I quoted Barbara Ehrenreich on August 10, and I am drawn to her wisdom again. She was asked in an interview what she would give up to live in a more human world. She answered, “I think we shouldn’t think of what we would give up to have a more human world; we should think of what we would gain.”

Choose life.

© Joanne Whitt 2025 all rights reserved.

Resources:
Karoline Lewis, “Carrying the Cross,” August 28, 2016,
http://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=4706.

No Bouncers

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Mark 9:38-50

   Just before this exchange with his disciples, Jesus catches them arguing over which one of them will be the greatest.  In this passage, the disciple named John has learned of somebody who is healing in Jesus’ name, imitating the work of Jesus.  John has problems with this healer’s credentials.  He’s not following us, John says.  How do we know he has it right?  The disciples seem to think that it’s important for those who follow Jesus to do so in one prescribed way, their way.  This healer is not following the rules.  It’s not surprising that the disciples would conclude their way is the right way; they’ve given up a great deal to follow Jesus. They’ve left their homes, families, and livelihoods.  But it looks as though they’ve also become attached to being the special ones, the insiders. 

  Jesus gives a two-part response: First, he answers the specific question.  Don’t stop him.  If he’s doing it in my name, he’s on the right track.  If he’s not against us, he’s for us.  Look at what he’s doing, not at his credentials. 

   It’s the second part of his response that’s harder to read.  These verses are often interpreted as a dire warning about temptations to sin.  But what’s interesting here is that the warning is aimed at his disciples directly in response to their challenge to the credentials of an outsider.  Jesus knows the damage that can arise from “I’m right, you’re wrong” relationships.  His ongoing conflict with the Pharisees is over their insistence that anyone who doesn’t follow their rules is a spiritual outsider.  Maybe he even had some insight into the evils that would be done in his name in the millennia to follow, when Christians encounter others, both other Christians and non-Christians, who aren’t doing things or believing things in exactly “the right way.”

   Jesus is clearly exasperated.  “Don’t get in the way of those who believe in me,” says Jesus.  Don’t put obstacles, stumbling blocks, in the path of those who are not yet strong in faith.  If you do, says Jesus, then you, the disciples, have stumbled; you’ve messed up big time.  His harsh tone tells us how important it is that the disciples understand it’s their job to take the wide view of faith, not the narrow one.  The followers of Jesus aren’t supposed to be a little clique off in the corner.  One writer put it like this: “If, to use one of Jesus’ own analogies, the coming of the kingdom is like the start of a grand dinner party, then Jesus wants his followers to be like gracious hosts welcoming the guests…. Jesus neither needs nor wants bouncers guarding the door to the grand feast he is initiating.”

   We are to welcome, wherever we find them, the allies of the Christian faith.  When we see people doing those things that Jesus taught and in which Jesus rejoiced in others – mercy, justice, integrity, reverence, faith, love – welcome them.  Make room for them.    

   Then Jesus says, “Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”  In the ancient world, salt was used to cleanse and preserve as well as to season.  Jesus seems to be referring to both uses.  The cleansing/preserving aspect is that the disciples are to be harder on themselves than they are on others; they are to hold themselves to high standards of service and compassion while at the same time making room for others on the journey of faith.  If they do this, they will bring good flavor – saltiness – to their ministry, and to the world.  They will be at peace with each other because they won’t be competing to be the greatest or scrambling to maintain discipleship as an exclusive, private club.

© Joanne Whitt 2024 all rights reserved.

Resources: “A Season of Discernment: The Final Report of the Theological Task Force on the Peace, Unity and Purity of the Church,” approved by the 217th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) (2006).

The Disruptive Jesus

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John 2:13-22

The story we call “the cleansing of the temple” appears in all four gospels. That’s a pretty good clue that it actually happened. But while Matthew, Mark, and Luke put it at the end of Jesus’ ministry, just before the arrest that leads to his crucifixion, John puts it up front, soon after Jesus’ miracle at the wedding at Cana. As one commentator puts it, John uses the words of the other three gospels but never the tune.

It was at the wedding at Cana that Jesus turned water into wine. John gives us an important detail: the water was in stone jars, which meant it was used for the rites of purification. By the time of Jesus, there was an elaborate system of purification. Some things were considered pure or clean, and others impure or unclean. Women were unclean seven days after the birth of a son, 14 days after the birth of a daughter. Dead bodies were unclean; certain foods were unclean; the list had grown very, very long. The system created a world with sharp social boundaries between pure and impure, righteous and sinner, whole and not whole, male and female, rich and poor, Jew and Gentile. Changing this water into wine was symbolic of breaking down these barriers.

The Temple was the heart of the purity system. The animals being sold there were required for sacrifice. Moneychangers were an essential part of the system because it was idolatrous to use Roman coins stamped with the emperor’s image to buy your sacrifice. The moneychangers were giving pure tokens in exchange for impure money. When you added up the temple tax required of every Jewish male, the cost of animals for required sacrifices, the fee for the money changers, and the travel costs associated with coming to Jerusalem at least once a year, the whole thing added up to big business. It also meant the poorer you were, and the less able you were, the less access you had to a good relationship with God.

Jesus was not the first to cry out against this system. Centuries before Jesus, the prophet Micah asked, “Will God be pleased with thousands of rams, with 10,000 rivers of oil? …. God has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” The prophet Amos raised a similar cry, “Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them,” says God, “but let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream.” But the system persisted, so Jesus lost his temper. He drove the moneychangers and the animals out of the Temple and overturned their tables.

I’m very careful with this passage. Anyone who has ever lived with a person who explodes knows that the last thing that people with bad tempers need is biblical approval of their temper tantrums. I think we need a bit more humility than Jesus when it comes to a situation like this. As much as I affirm that we’re all to be more Christ-like, perhaps this is one of those times when we should ask, “What did Jesus mean?” instead of “What would Jesus do?”

There are several layers of interpretation possible here. Some commentators see a prophetic prediction of the destruction of the temple that occurred in 70 AD. Others understand the story as a restoration of the temple to its sacred purpose, as a place of prayer for all people, without exploitation. A third approach suggests that Jesus fulfills all the functions of the temple building as the place to meet God.

All these interpretations are compelling, but we also see that Jesus disrupts things. He challenged the rules that named things and people pure or impure in almost everything he did. Debie Thomas writes, “Jesus is not about ‘business as usual.’ Jesus is not a protector of the status quo. Jesus has no interest in propping up institutions of faith that elevate comfort and complacency over holiness and justice.”

That leaves us with a handful of questions. What are we passionate about when it comes to our faith? Have we settled for a way of being Christian that is more safe, casual, and comfortable than it is disorienting, challenging, and transformative? One of my heroes is Janie Spahr, the tireless evangelist for LGBTQ+ rights in the church. Janie says, “If you ever have the chance to get in trouble for the sake of Jesus — Do it.”

Are you willing to get in trouble for Jesus? Am I? These are terrific Lenten questions.

© Joanne Whitt 2024 all rights reserved.

Resources:
Debie Thomas, “Not in God’s House,” https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/2937-not-in-god-s-house
Marcus Borg, Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time (New York: HarperColins, 1994)

Losing to Find

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Mark 8:31-38

   Three times during his journey from Galilee to Jerusalem, Jesus speaks of his impending death and resurrection, and each time, he pairs this announcement with a teaching about following him.  We read the first one here in Chapter 8, verses 31-38.  In the New Revised Standard Version, Jesus says, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”

   Scary, right?  Whenever we hit a scary or difficult teaching of Jesus, the best approach is to look at it in the context of his other teachings.  Jesus taught about nonviolence, a simple lifestyle, love of the poor, love of enemies, forgiveness, inclusivity, mercy, healing; he taught about not seeking status, power, privilege, and possessions.  These teachings tell us that human beings matter to God; that who you are matters to God.  So “deny yourself” and “take up your cross” can’t be read in a way that devalues human life and well-being.  In other words, these verses cannot be a request that people denigrate themselves in order to “bear their cross” and suffer, as this passage has sometimes been read.  Not all suffering is sacrificial or beneficial, and we should be deeply suspicious of any statements that justify abuse or oppression.  We need to read these words in the light of what Jesus called the two greatest commandments: that we are to love God and love our neighbors as ourselves. 

   That’s a good place to start in trying to understand this passage: To deny yourself and to take up your cross must in some way further these two great commandments.  To deny ourselves and to take up our crosses must help us, somehow, to choose the connection with God and each other that God chooses.  

   We get a hint from Jesus’ conversation with his disciples.  His disciples weren’t bombarded with 5000 advertising images every day as we are, telling them what they are supposed to look like and drive and wear and eat to be successful or cool or hip.  But they still imagine that the secret to life is strength and power, the 3 A’s of appearance, achievement, and affluence, rather than vulnerability and love.  So they interpret Jesus’ miraculous acts as demonstrations of power rather than manifestations of love.  Jesus explains to them that the predictable outcome of insisting on living in God’s kingdom rather than in Caesar’s, of living the way of love rather than the way of domination, will be his death.  The disciples, and Peter in particular, throw a fit.  Jesus needs to win!  Conquer!  Defeat!  Not be conquered and be killed.  Jesus turns on Peter and accuses him of being the mouthpiece of the dark side.  Peter’s way of thinking is the opposite of God’s thinking. 

   What Jesus is saying is that they, and we, need to go through some form of death – psychological, spiritual, relational, or physical – in order to loosen our ties to the way of winning and defeating, the way of the 3 A’s, the way of disconnection from God and each other. To “deny yourself” is to embrace the truth that we can’t live together peaceably, we can’t save our planet, we can’t thrive, without understanding that we’re all connected. 

   Karoline Lewis writes, “Lent is a denial of the self in the best way, the self that refuses community. The self that thinks it can survive on its own. The self that rejects the deep need of humanity: belonging.” This is a whole lot harder than giving up chocolate for 6 weeks.  Jesus doesn’t sugar coat this.  The images he uses are of sacrifice and death.  Becoming aware of whatever it is in us that gets in the way of loving God and loving our neighbors as ourselves, including loving ourselves, is hard work.  As Richard Rohr writes, “Before the truth ‘sets you free,’ it tends to make you miserable.”

   It is hard work but it is holy work and we do not do it alone.  God is all about resurrection.  The dailiness of the work fits my experience: every single day, daily dying to what does not give life, and daily rising to what does.  Jesus promises this is what will save us.  This is how we will find ourselves and each other. 

© Joanne Whitt 2024 all rights reserved.            

Resources:

Karoline Lewis, “A Different Kind of Denial,” February 22, 2015, http://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=3542

Richard Rohr, Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2011).

David Lose, http://www.davidlose.net/2015/02/lent-2-b/

Come and See

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Lesson: John 1:43-52

“Come and see.” If you heard those words in an everyday context, I’m guessing you’d be curious. You’d probably stop what you’re doing and go see.

“Come and see” is a theme throughout John’s Gospel. From the early disciples to the Pharisee named Nicodemus, to the Samaritan women at the well, to the man born blind, to Pilate and Thomas, characters in John’s Gospel see Jesus. Seeing in John’s gospel, truly seeing, is followed by believing. John’s point is that the faith of the disciples was not naïve gullibility. It was a response to what they saw and experienced. Just before this passage, Jesus speaks these words to Andrew. “Come and see.” Andrew and his brother Simon Peter do see, and they decide to follow Jesus. Jesus then comes to Galilee and bids Philip, “Follow me.” Philip not only follows, but he seeks out Nathaniel to invite him to do the same.

Nathaniel’s first response is skeptical, even insulting. Scholars think maybe his comment, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” reflects a small town rivalry between Nathaniel’s town, Cana, and Nazareth. But Philip invites him, “Come and see,” and Nathaniel’s skepticism is overcome by the actual encounter with Jesus. He goes from skeptical and sarcastic to utterly convinced. He is transformed. Jesus seems to have that effect on people.

Come and see. Many progressive Christians, and I count myself among them, shy away from evangelism, both the word and the deed. But this passage shows we’re not called to cram our faith down anyone’s throat or question their eternal destiny or threaten them with hellfire, but instead, simply to offer an invitation to come and see. Come and see what God is still doing in and through Jesus and the community of disciples who have chosen to follow him.

Lutheran pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber writes about the team that put together the website for the church she served in Denver. Most churches have a “What we believe” tab on their websites, and they debated what theirs would say. They toyed with having a tab that, when you clicked on it, went straight to the Nicene Creed. Quite wisely, in my opinion, they rejected that idea. Finally, one person said, “Why don’t we just have it say, ‘If you want to know what we believe, come and see what we do.’”

“‘If you want to know what we believe, come and see what we do.’”

The Martin Luther King Jr. holiday is January 15. As Dr. King reminded us, “…love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend. We never get rid of an enemy by meeting hate with hate; we get rid of an enemy by getting rid of enmity. … By its very nature, hate destroys and tears down; by its very nature, love creates and builds up. Love transforms with redemptive power.”

What might happen if congregations were able to say, “Come and see how love is transforming us. Come and see love at work, creating, building up, turning enemies into friends”?

“‘If you want to know what we believe, come and see what we do.’”

© Joanne Whitt 2024 all rights reserved.