Proper 18 Year C 9/7/2025
Jeremiah 18:1-11; Psalm 139:1-5, 12-17; Philemon 1-21; Luke 14:25-33
Rev. Mark A. Lafler
When I hear our Gospel reading this morning…
And as I contemplate the words of our savior Jesus Christ…
Only one response seems appropriate…
What in the world is going on?
Can Jesus be serious?
If we want to follow Jesus we have to hate our father and mother?
Hate our spouse? Hate our children? Hate brothers, sisters…
Hate even life itself?
I thought the church was about family values?
How can the same person say “love your enemies” and also say “hate your families” – is this a twisted joke?
Besides…
How can Jesus say hate your parents when in the Gospel of Mark he quoted Moses saying, “‘Respect your father and mother,’ and, ‘Anyone denouncing father or mother should be killed’” (Mark 7:9-13).
How can Jesus demand hatred toward one’s wife or husband when in Ephesians we read, “Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives, exactly as Christ did for the church” (Ephesians 5:25).
And, I thought Jesus liked children?
He even scolded his disciples when they tried to get rid of the children around him.
He rebuked them saying, “Don’t push these children away. Don’t ever get between them and me. These children are at the very center of life in the kingdom” (Mark 10:16).
Jesus even commanded us to be “reconciled to our brother” (Matthew 5:24) and here he says “hate your brother and sisters.”
Barbara Brown Taylor says Jesus wouldn’t have made a very good parish minister, and judging from what he says here…
I think she has a pretty good point.
And that was just for starters.
He goes on to talk about carrying one’s cross, about counting the cost, about giving up all one’s possessions.
“Whoever does not…” Jesus is saying to them, “cannot.”
Yeah, I would think that would thin out the crowd in a hurry, don’t you? In fact, some of you, after hearing these words, might even be tempted not to come back to church.
I don’t know…
I certainly hope that won’t be the case, of course…
But these are hard sayings of Jesus.
Even a lot of the church growth studies show that in order to grow you have to give people what they want…
Such as a trendy Coffee Shop…
Comfy chairs with tables…
Hype music, and all that…
which appears to be the exact opposite of what Jesus is doing.
“Whoever does not… cannot.”
Imagine if we told our ushers in the narthex to welcome our guests by saying something like this:
Welcome… But! …Are you absolutely sure you want to do this?
After all, the Jesus whose name we are about to worship says we’ve got to hate our families and ourselves in order to follow him,
and we have to give up our possessions.
So think about it before you sit down on the pew.
So what is going on with Jesus message?
Well the context is important…
Luke mentions that large crowds were following Jesus…
They were witnessing his teachings,
his healings,
his miraculous acts…
and some of them…
maybe most of them…
were ready to jump on board and become disciples…
Man! This guy has it all…
Flair, supernatural ability,
wonderful leader and teacher.
Jesus was clarifying that it was not all a bed of roses…
In fact, it was not a bed of roses at all…
Jesus often used a startling paradox to make his point…
You see… the family…
The structure of family lay at the heart of first century Judaism.
But Jesus was creating a new family, a new structure,
He was building a new family around himself.
And those who followed him would certainly incur the wrath both of their Jewish family and friends…
Remember this is first century Judea…
One’s Jewish family would not be excited that you would choose to be a follower of Jesus Christ and part of the Christian movement.
They wouldn’t be saying: That’s great for you?
It would also eventually bring the wrath of Rome…
The imperial empire…
Rome claimed Caesar is Lord and the Roman Empire is his kingdom.
Jesus was launching a different kingdom movement that proclaims Jesus is Lord (and not Caesar).
Jesus, most certainly, did NOT mean that we are to literally hate our family members…
We can see that this was not the practice of his disciples or the early church….
but to put any family member or person above our commitment to Christ is a lack of true discipleship.
In some cases, discipleship does cost one’s family.
I have worked with many missionaries who minister the love of Christ in the Muslim world.
Indeed, it usually cost a young Christian convert his or her family when they confess Jesus is Lord and their baptism must be done in secret.
They are usually forsaken by their parents, siblings, and the community. They might not be able to find employment and in some cases are put to death because of their conversion.
In North America, we often do not have to choose between our family and being a disciple of Jesus.
But, we too must count the cost.
Like the builder of the tower who must estimate the cost and decide to build…
we must measure the cost of our discipleship to Jesus.
Like the king who is being invaded and must weigh the cost of seeking peace or fighting for freedom…
we too must sit down and reckon whether we can afford to refuse the demands of discipleship.
Counting the costs is an important thing to do…
You know, often after watching the Olympic Games many children, especially young girls want to become the next superstar gymnast…
But are they ready to count the cost?
Simone Biles, who is the most decorated gymnast in history… According to Women’s Health Magazine her normal week includes this:
An early morning breakfast, then a short trip to the gym
Stretching
a grueling 3 hours of training
More stretching
A short lunch
More stretching
another 3 hours of training
More stretching… followed by therapy
And then repeats all of it the next day.
On top of all this she swims for a mile twice a week,
bikes 10 miles or runs a mile before practice, and strength training…
And don’t think she eats whatever she wants. Her diet consists of egg whites, chicken, fish, rice, carrots, bananas and plain grain cereal.
That’s dedication…
that’s knowing the cost and following through.
Our gospel phrases it a bit differently
Jesus says: …carry the cross.
Carrying the cross was not a metaphor in Jesus’ day…
It didn’t mean “take the tough road” or “to carry a burden”
It meant death…
In the first century, the cross was not a piece of jewelry or an ornament to aid worship…
It was the Roman Empire’s most brutal form of capital punishment.
In Jesus day, the only thing the cross meant was death by Roman execution.
Christ was demanding that discipleship costs a person’s life.
- S. Lewis writes in Mere Christianity:
The Christian way is different (than the rest of the world)…
Christ says, “Give me all. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want you.
I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it.
No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down… Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked – the whole outfit.”
The call of discipleship with Christ is a call for our whole person.
St. Paul’s letter to Philemon (that we heard today) helps bring this point home.
Philemon was a Christian fellow in the first century.
He was pretty wealthy because he was able to host the church in his house and he owned some slaves.
One of his slaves, Onesimus, ran away and ended up in prison with St. Paul where he was converted to the Christian faith.
When Onesimus was being sent back to his slave owner, Philemon,
Paul wrote this letter to plead with Philemon not to accept him as a slave, but as a brother – a beloved brother.
St. Paul wrote, “…welcome him as you would welcome me… and if he owes you anything, I will repay it…”
Philemon had a choice…
Live by his rights as a wealthy slave owner…
Or give up his rights because he was a disciple of Jesus…
We too have a choice…
do we live by what we think we deserve…
perhaps by our rights…
by our stature or reputation in this world.
Or are we crucified with Christ…
no longer living for ourselves but Christ who is in us…
living our baptism where we are dead to ourselves and alive in Christ.
Do we choose our culture, our society, our way of life, our possessions…
or do we forsake the world and its goods…
for the sake of the Kingdom of God?
This is a hard text from Jesus… a hard message… right?
And yet even in the command to carry the cross and follow Jesus…
There is grace… God’s gift to us.
Because it’s that very cross that Jesus gave up his life on that we find our strength, our purpose, our true selves.
Because of the love of Jesus on the cross he invites us to follow him…
Knowing very well that it is an impossible task to pick up our cross and follow him in our own strength.
But through Christ Jesus we discover by his grace that we can follow.
Through faith we follow Jesus and the way of the cross…
Where the impossible becomes possible…
By the Holy Spirit who is with us.
So, as we hear, as we listen and contemplate these hard words of Jesus…
The promise we have is that we are not alone.
That Jesus is with us and remains with us…
And that only through Jesus can we truly carry the cross and follow him.
And it’s in that very act that we find who we are in Christ…
We find hope, forgiveness, and love.
Thanks be to God…
who sent his Son Jesus to redeem us…
and set us free from the penalty of our sins…
so that we are free by the power of the Holy Spirit…
to serve him and be with him forever.
Amen.
