Luke 14: 25-27 Hating Your Life?

Luke 14:25-27 Hating Your Life?

[25] Now large crowds were traveling with him; and he turned and said to them, [26] "Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. [27] Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.

What is happening in this scripture? - It is difficult for many of us to imagine that the Jesus we love would hate anything, let alone advise his followers to hate their family, and life. I do not know how many times his sayings have been orally repeated, rewritten, re-scribed, added to, taken away from, changed, etc. by zealous adherents. I also do not know what the word “hate” translated from Aramaic to Greek to English would originally mean. Such is the mystery of biblical scholarship. But we might get some hints by looking at what we think we know about Jesus’ life and the total context of his sayings, aphorisms, and actions. If Jesus hated anything, it was probably injustice in any form. Perhaps the original context of this scripture had to do with priorities. Maybe it could have sounded something like, Anyone who puts his father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sister, or even their own life over and above their desire to do God’s will, cannot be my disciple.

How is this happening in the world today? - I do not need to tell anyone that making a conscious choice to try and follow the Way of Jesus, requires intention and discipline. Jesus told the crowd they must take up THE cross and follow him. In Matthew, I believe he says take up YOUR cross. When we consciously do this, we will, for sure, run into resistance, sometimes immediately. How long does it take people like us, leaving a meaningful sermon on Sunday morning, to fall into the melee of the “world out there” without even realizing it? Douglas Ottati speaks of that moment of silence between the end of the recessional and when the doors of the church are re-opened, and we can hear the sounds of the outside world. We are about to, as disciples of Christ, go back into that world.
When we watch and study the Way of Jesus, we see that what he did, standing against injustice, economic oppression, systematic evil, and daring to remind his people that God was the king, and not Caesar, cost him his life. He was put to death by what Dominic Crossan called the “normalcy of civilization.” The world of human beings can’t stand the Kingdom of God for too long, I think, and like an amoeba, we humans can be surrounded and slowly digested back into the morass of that “normalcy”. That is why we must make intentional, conscious effort through what is referred to as the spiritual disciplines of prayer, study, worship, giving and serving, contemplation, fellowship and sistership, to keep that normalcy from re-digesting us back into our prior estrangement. That is where confession, forgiveness, patience, discipline, hard work, and honesty and humility come in.
But more important than all that, I think, Jesus was telling the crowd, and us, that if we allow ourselves to love that normalcy, then we cut ourselves off from the kingdom. I don’t think that means that Jesus hated life, or people. I think he hated what we people do with life, and with and to each other, that separates us from that kingdom of grace, love and forgiveness. This, I believe, is the cross that WE must bear. It isn’t easy, and as Deitrich Bonhoeffer said, it isn’t a cheap grace. But is surely is worth it.

How is this story my story? – Jesus, I want to follow your Way. But I get scared and lazy. Help me by your grace to realize and remember the joy and purpose you offer when I take up the cross and seek your path. May it be so. -RSP