The Cost You Cannot Pay

5th Sunday after Pentecost

Luke 9:51-62

June 27, 2010

Jesus sets before you today the cost of discipleship.

If you wish to follow after him, what price can you expect to pay?

Everything, it seems.

In summary, there are two requirements for discipleship:

First, give up any hope of a permanent home in this present world.

Second, give up any family ties on this earth.

These are not easy requirements.

A man came to Jesus. "Lord, I will follow you wherever you go."

But Jesus replied, "I’m not going anywhere. I have no hole like a fox; no nest like a bird, nowhere to lay my head. I have no home in this world, and no destination. You want that life, come ahead.”

“Let me first bury my father; then I will follow.” Let the dead bury the dead; the kingdom of God must be first.

“Let me bid farewell to those at home.” You will never plow straight furrows looking behind and not ahead.

Why does Jesus make it so hard?

This falls under the category called The Cost of Discipleship. Said famously by Detrick Bonheoffer, “When Christ bids a man to follow, the bids that man to come and die.”

It is not a hobby or an occasional pursuit. The summons to die is the summons of a lifetime.

Here on earth no place is truly home, no family is final, no concern or pursuit is greater than being a disciple of Christ.

And all we have is ultimately secondary to Christ.

No time to bury the dead or bid farewells.

The press of being called to Christ – the summons to die – is too urgent . . . and some would say, too harsh.

But the summons to put Christ first is also a summons to freedom.

In which case, it is not harsh.

It is liberating.

These things around us are important, but not finally important.

They are valuable to us, but they are not our ultimate treasure.

They have a crucial place in our life here, but they are not our first concern.

We are called to die now with Christ – in baptism – so we do not have to worry about dying for anything else, dying for anything less, later.

This summons to discipleship – this radical call to leave all behind - is a summons to freedom in Christ.

It is a summons to be liberated from “sin, death, and the devil.”

Or as sometimes put, “sin, death, and the world.”

I love that phrase: Sin, Death, and the World.

It is a summary of everything to which we find ourselves in bondage.

But we live in an odd world these days and the very things that phrase describes are the very things this culture is trying hard to ignore.

Sin?

Naw, not sin. No more than a mere error of judgment swiftly corrected by 30-day voluntary confinement in rehab, or maybe a three-month self-imposed suspension from PGA golf tournaments.

Death?

We no longer mourn or grieve; we instead seek closure.

The World?

We like our world, a lot.

So when Christ says, follow me, I have no home.

When he says, let the dead bury the dead.

When he says, if you look back you are unfit to plow straight furrows.

Then he is saying, get yourself free for the real thing.

What?

That’s hard to do, you say?

Of course it is.

And do you know why?

Because we let things intrude upon us; we can’t help it.

I have to get tires rotated, new valves put in and new valve stems, and have the tires resealed, and do it before we leave on vacation.

Ask my wife, I have talked about this at least hourly for the last week.

So you tell me? How do I put Christ first when all I can think about are tires?

So, yes, Christ above everything else is hard.

He wouldn’t ask if it was easy.

It wouldn’t be called a “demand” if it wasn’t demanding.

There would no cost to discipleship were there no price to pay.

So, let us be clear:

The demands made by Christ go beyond your strength.

You have not the faith, nor the devotion to do as he requires of his disciples.

You have only his strength upon which to rely.

But this too is part of our freedom in Christ.

St. Paul, Martin Luther, Bonheoffer

– they and many, many others had a notion that if you live always trying to avoid doing the wrong thing . . .

. . . you will never summon the freedom or the courage to do the right thing.

The demands of discipleship are beyond your strength.

Never the less, said Luther, sin boldly, and trust Christ more boldly still.

Whaa?

What Luther means is, live your life, fulfill your obligations to home and family and get the tires fixed

– sin boldly in other words –

– and trust Christ first.

Ultimately, the cost of discipleship is nothing you can pay.

It is what Christ has already paid for you.

Therefore, look in faith to your true home, the New Jerusalem in glory.

Look in faith to your new family, with the Church as your mother, and Christ as your brother, and God as your Father.

Live your life, and look to Christ.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Amen.