Sermon, July 1, 2004 -- Acts 1:3-14

“Motion Verbs” (Luke 9:51-62)
Rick Olson, July 1, 2004

We’re well into Ordinary Time, which is anything but ordinary, actually . . . it’s the time when the lectionary readings turn to discipleship, how we should behave in the world, both as a church, as the body of Christ, and individually. It’s kind of what this time of year’s all about, and let me tell you it can be as painful for me as for anybody else, when I compare my life, to the Christian ideal . . . today’s passage is a case in point, it’s a turning point in Luke’s story, when Jesus turns to Jerusalem. Biblical scholars recognize this as the beginning of Luke’s central section, but we know it as the journey to Jerusalem, and we also know what happens when he gets there . . . and so did the original audience for the Gospel, the folks Luke wrote the gospel for, some fifty years after Jesus’ death . . . the people in Luke’s church knew what happened at Jerusalem, so the first sentence of our passage is freighted with meaning, with pathos, because before he was “taken up” into heaven on that cloud, he was nailed to a cross.

And this foreshadowing sets a mood for this whole section— it reminds us right off the bat that whatever we say about living the Christian life is in the framework of Christ’s death, and further, everything we’re told about Christian living, all we’re asked to do and give up, pales next to what Jesus did . . . we’re told that he “set his face” to go to Jerusalem . . . he set his face to go there. He is resigned to going, no matter what is fated to happen at journey’s end, he’s determined . . . Luke repeats the phrase, it’s so important. And those Gospel-fall-guy Samaritans wouldn’t receive him precisely because of this, because his face was set toward Jerusalem.

And so this introduction to Jesus’ final journey is packed full of significance . . . we’re meant to feel its finality, its fate, its inevitability . . . Jesus set his face toward his destiny, which was the cross. And all of a sudden, we’re blinded by a flurry of motion verbs, verbs of movement, that are conspicuous in our English translation, but really stand out in the Greek . . .there are five different verbs of motion – going, going out, coming down, entering, following – used fifteen different times. Going, going, going, going, going. It reminds me of somebody who just can’t sit still before the start of a trip . . . I myself have been know to be a little – how shall we say it? – impatient at that time. Well, maybe that’s too genteel a word, perhaps obnoxious better. You ready? Come on . . . you can do that in the car. We’ve gotta go, get down the road, if we don’t go, if we don’t leave, we’ll just never get out of here . . . aren’t you ready yet? Why didn’t you do that before now? What have you been doing all morning? Let’s just go . . . and my long-suffering family has put up with it all these years, though it’s a wonder they haven’t done something totally un-Christian and thrown me off an overpass . . .

And our passage is all about that, all about going, going, going, it’s all about the motion, the journey. It’s about the Christian life as going, as following, as doing, only unlike my fruitless, fitful, manic-ness, our passage is about motion as ministry, movement as the mission of God. It tells us what kind is appropriate, and what kind . . . isn’t. They’re negative examples, like on that BBC show what not to wear, only here it’s what not to do in the mission of God. Jesus sends out messengers to prepare his way –does that remind you of something? – and they enter a Samaritan town. And we know all about those Samaritans, don’t we? They’re like the poor cousins of righteous, God-fearing Israelites, but it’s really another kind of foreshadowing . . . Jesus will carry the Gospel to the entire world, even the hated Samaritans . . . but not yet . . . now he is rejected – like he will be at journey’s end . . .

And James and John are mortally offended by the slight, they’re hungering for vengeance, itching for a fight. “Do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” Huh? huh? do you wanna, do you wanna? They remind me of a comic-book henchmen, saying to their mob boss “Can I hit ‘em? Huh? Can I boss, can I?” But unlike the mob boss, who always gives them permission in the end, Jesus just looks at them and rebukes them . . . and this word rebuke is the same word Luke uses to describe Jesus commanding the demons of Capernaum and the wind and the raging waves . . . it’s a word of power, of directive so this has the force of a commandment: Jesus commands them not to call down fire on the Samaritans.

It’s important for us to see the pattern here. He’s rejected, like he will be at Jerusalem, and he refuses vengeance, like he will at Jerusalem. So the first thing “not to do” is “Don’t exact retribution. Don’t seek vengeance. Don’t use violence to punish the Samaritans.” Talk about your radical notion . . . it’s human nature to want to get back at someone who’s done us wrong, it’s the way of the world. Individuals do it, cities do it, governments do it. A large chunk of our foreign policy is based on the notion of deterrence – other nations are deterred from attacking us – theoretically, at least – for fear of what we might do in return. As Teddy Roosevelt was supposed to have said, speak softly and carry a big stick. Only here, Jesus commands James and John to put down the stick, to not be punitive, to not use violence. And it’s a policy Jesus stuck to his entire life, even in the face of certain death. He who could call legions of angels down to protect him, who could call down his own fire from heaven, thank you very much, did not once use violence – or the threat of it – as a means to achieve his ends.

And James and John – it’s curious, isn’t it, that it’s the same two who, over in Mark, ask to be first in heaven – James and John, after several years of running around Palestine with Jesus, still don’t get what he’s about. They still don’t get that he’s about anything but bringing fire and brimstone down on some hapless Samaritan, no matter how much they dissed him.

Well. The rest of the passage is framed by yet another motion verb – follow – only this time it has more than one connotation, it means more than just trailing around physically over the countryside. When that first someone—notice Luke doesn’t say who, the teaching is about us all—when he or she says “I will follow you wherever you go” she’s saying both physically and philosophically, as in I will accompany you to Jerusalem and beyond, and I will be your disciple. And does Jesus say “Thank you very much?” or “I’m very grateful for your support?” No. He comes out with a warning: “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” In other words, if you follow me, it’s not gonna be to some comfy motel, or a nice room with a view, it’s gonna be tough and you’re not going to have any refuge, any shelter. Jesus is truth in advertising personified: there’s nothing about the Christian life that’s comfy or cushy, he’s not like some of these televangelists who preach prosperity doctrine, who say if you just commit to Jesus, it’ll be returned, a hundred-fold, and you’ll have victory, victory, I tell you . . . and this is a consistent witness of Jesus and his followers, from Peter to James to Paul, right through the New Testament. The Christian life might be fire insurance in heaven, but it sure ain’t here on earth.

So the first things we’re should understand is that (a) it isn’t going to be any blooming bed of roses and (b) we’re not supposed to pretend that it is. And now to one more motion verb, follow Jesus gives a command: “Follow me.” Follow me. There isn’t a lot of room for wiggle, is there? Pretty cut and dried, but the other tries to find some, anyway: “Lord,” she says, “Let me first go and bury my father.” Now this seems perfectly reasonable, especially by our standards, where we’ve been taught to place the biological family above every thing else. The person wants to go take care of family business, and what’s wrong with that? Honor thy father and thy mother, for Pete’s sake.

But Jesus isn’t having any of it: “Let the dead bury their own dead;” he says. Ouch! Not very pastoral, is it? You can’t have a week off to mourn, or even a day: “As for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” Loyalty to Jesus comes before any other loyalty, even loyalty to the idol of family. But this shouldn’t surprise any of us, should it? After all, there’s that seminal story in all three synoptic gospels – and by seminal, I mean “one we try to ignore” – where Jesus refuses to see his family, saying that “Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.” Contrary to what we’re taught in this culture, we’re not to worship our biological family, we’re not to use our family obligations to avoid the mission of God, to skip our responsibilities of discipleship. Loyalty to Christ trumps loyalty to family any day of the week.

Finally, one more unidentified person comes up to Jesus and says “I’ll follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to the folks.” And this certainly sounds reasonable, doesn’t it? It couldn’t take too long to do that, could it? But Jesus answers in an elliptical – but clearly negative – way: “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” And Luke’s readers would have understood this as a reference to Elijah, who allowed Elisha to go back and kiss mom and dad – see, Jesus says, it’s harder to follow me that to follow Elijah, and you know what a stickler he was. But wait, there’s more! What happens when you look back while you’re plowing, while you’re walking along behind a mule or a horse? The plowing gets messed up, doesn’t it? The way becomes crooked, not straight, and we know how God loves a straight path. You can’t look back in regret, you can’t have ties to the mundane when you’re doing the work of the Lord.

And again I say: Ouch! This is harsh stuff. Surely Jesus couldn’t have meant all this literally . . . there’s gotta be some metaphorical kinds of things going on here. Service to Christ comes before service to family? Proclaiming the word comes before putting food on the table? Maybe Jesus is just testing them, maybe he sees into their hearts that they’re not ready. Maybe the father of the second guy isn’t dead, and won’t be for years . . . but none of that is even hinted at in the passage . . . just the opposite, in fact: all signs point to its being meant literally. When you look at the first part – the foreshadowing of the crucifixion and the renunciation of violence – and put it together with the last, it gives a coherent picture: Jesus was on his way to die for us, he set his face to Jerusalem, set his face toward it, and it’s clear that the same kind of single-mindedness is required of the disciples as well. Jesus gave the most precious possession for us, his own life, and we are required to return the compliment.

I was talking to someone the other day, and she complained that the rate of planned giving, the rate of bequests to the church, has fallen drastically, people just leave it to their families instead, and I shrugged and said: Well, what do you expect? They’ve internalized the lesson we in the church teach, the lesson society has taught – for whatever reason – and we’ve acquiesced to the notion that biological family is all important. There are family values on display here, it’s just that they’re not the values of Ozzie and Harriet – or even Ozzie Osbourne; they’re Jesus’ family values, they’re Kingdom family values, not the values of the world..

And I’m tempted to leave it at that, to let this uncompromising word stand alone, to let us all cogitate on it, chew on it, maybe get mad at it . . . after all, that’s what Luke did. He told the story and got out of the way, moved on down the road to another stop on the journey. But though we don’t have time to unpack all its amazing ramifications, I’ll throw in a couple of few words. Two, in fact: Christian community. “My mother and my brothers,” Christ said “are those who hear the word of God and do it.” Just as he radically redefined society – the last shall be first, and the first shall be last – Jesus radically reimagined family. In the Kingdom of God, our family extends to all Christians everywhere, and at any time. We might not feel it all the time, we might not feel a familial closeness in our individual congregations, but it’s true: India, Africa, Kuala-Lampur. Egypt, Iraq, Latin America. We are one in Christ, sisters and brothers, heirs according to the promise of God. Amen.