Homily – 6/25/17
A group of people were trying to cut a path through a dense jungle. They had been divided into three groups; workers, managers and leaders. The largest group were the workers and they were the folks who stood shoulder to shoulder with machetes in their hands, hacking away at the foliage. It was hard and tiring work. The second group was the managers. It was their job to make sure the machetes were sharpened, to develop a stretching program to help the workers stay limber, and to develop a break schedule to ensure that the workers got some relief. The final group were the leaders. It was their job to determine the overall direction and to chart the course.
As they begin, the workers start their labor in the oppressive heat. They stand side by side swinging their machetes, sweating and looking forward to their next break. The managers stand behind them and track their progress on clipboards. They ensure that job rotation takes place, the machetes are properly sharpened, and make sure the workers stay at their task. While this takes place, the leader climbs the tallest tree he can find. As he looks out across the jungle, he realizes something important. He shouts down to the workers and the managers, “We need to stop. We are heading in the wrong direction.” To which they all respond, ‘shut up, we are making good progress!’
The leader here is clearly not earning any popularity points. For he has committed that unpardonable sin; he has told people something that they do not want to hear. Even though they are going the wrong way, the leader’s pronouncement has intruded upon their world in a decidedly unwelcome way.
In a scenario like this one, each person knows their role. The workers know what they are supposed to do, and the direction they travel is not something they are worried about. Such is the life of a worker, at least in Jesus’ time. Each of the disciples understands this role, as that is what they were. Simple fishermen, shepherds, farmers. Matthew may have been the only exception as a tax collector who had a more official role in the roman government. He was one of the managers, those folks who have an entrenched interest in making sure things run smoothly. Their status and position are dependent upon how well they can manage the people and the process. They want nothing to make their job more difficult or to jeopardize their position, so they tend to value the status quo above all things.
And then along comes the leader, and he has the audacity to tell them they are going the wrong way. Who does he thing he is? Are we supposed to stop the wheels of progress just because he says so? If we stop now we will never make our quota. And if we don’t make quota, the workers won’t get their scheduled break and the managers may not earn their bonus. Neither group has time for crazy pronouncements from the leader. So they ignore him.
But the leader knows that they are going the wrong way. If they stay on the course they are heading, they will not get to their destination. So he speaks even louder. He is persistent and won’t stop. And now he begins to get on the other people’s nerves. It is bad enough that he is interrupting their work, but now he just won’t shut up. He keeps telling them they are wrong and it is annoying them. So they start to shout back. They tell him he is the one who is wrong and they don’t need him. They being to vilify him and even threaten him. But he keeps on telling them they are going the wrong way, and they begin to hate him for it.
“A disciple is not above the teacher, nor a slave above the master; it is enough for the disciple to be like the teacher, and the slave like the master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household!” Jesus is telling the disciples exactly how hard it is going to be to follow him. For Jesus is like the leader in our story. He sees that the people and the rulers of the land are going in the wrong direction and he tells them so. And they begin to hate him for it. Jesus wants the disciples to clearly understand how difficult their path will be as his followers. People will call him all manner of awful things, and they will say the same and perhaps even worse about those who serve him.
It is not going to be easy to be a disciple. For people do not want to hear that they are going the wrong way. We all prefer to hear that we are already doing the right things. We want to hear that we can lose weight without exercise while eating anything we want. We want to hear that we can take expensive vacations and not have to pay for them. We want to hear that we can use people for our own purposes and there will be no consequences. But that is just not the case. And we tend to dislike the people who tell us otherwise.
That is what Jesus is telling the disciples. Be aware that the message I am giving you to bring will not be a popular one. People are not going to like to hear it, and they are not going to like you for bringing it. Even within families, it is not always easy to be the one who tells you that you are going the wrong way. You love the person, but you still need to tell them that their path is leading them to ruin.
“For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household.” Family is everything in the culture of their time and Jesus again wants the disciples to really understand the price they are going to pay to be bearers of his message. Not just strangers will recoil from them, but in all likelihood family will as well. This is the price of discipleship.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer talks about this in his work “The cost of discipleship.” He differentiates between cheap grace and costly grace. Cheap grace is a kind of no consequences grace. Cheap grace is spiritual junk food. It is the idea that you can eat pizza and ice cream every day and still lose weight. Cheap grace is the grace we pronounce upon ourselves, it is forgiveness without repentance, it comes with no real cost. But costly grace is something else. It is grace that we must seek. It is costly because it requires something of us and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus the Lord. The cost of discipleship then is exactly that, a cost we must pay to be Jesus’ followers and bearer of his message.
It is the cost of being willing to climb the tree and tell everyone they are going the wrong way, whether they like you for it or not.