So who wants to be a disciple of Jesus? He certainly doesn’t pull any punches about what it takes (Luke 14:25-33). First, hate your father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even life itself. Second, carry your own cross and follow him. And third, give up all your possessions.
It’s that simple and it’s that difficult. Jesus’ words don’t just sound black and white. They are black and white. It is all or nothing. We’re either in or we’re out. Those three things, the cost of discipleship, shaped Jesus’ life and ministry and they are to shape ours as well. Let me break these down one by one.
First: why is Jesus asking us to hate our family? Doesn’t Jesus talk about loving everyone, including our enemies? Yes, but the Greek word for “hate” means to prefer less. Jesus used strong language to make clear that nothing should take precedence over God. For Jesus, “hating” another is about reordering relationships and establishing new priorities. To be a disciple, we must love Jesus more than we love anyone else – even family members or life itself. In that sense Jesus “hated” his own life because he set aside his own will and preferences in favor of loving and obeying God. We are asked to do the same.
Second: a real disciple is someone who carries his cross. Many of us are confused about what it means to carry a cross. I’ve had someone say to me, “I have migraine headaches, but I guess it’s just the cross I must bear.” Or “I have an in-grown toenail, but I guess it’s just the cross I must bear.” The cross is NOT a headache or an ingrown toenail. The true message of the cross is death! In Jesus’ time the cross was an agonizing and tortuous mode of execution. When you saw someone carrying a cross, it meant only one thing – they were as good as dead. Following Christ means total submission to Him – perhaps even to the point of death. You and I won’t be truly liberated until we understand what it is to be crucified with Christ.
I read the story of a pregnant Korean woman who fled North Korea during the war. It was during a cold winter day. As night approached she began to have contractions. The baby was about to be born. She climbed down under a bridge, and there she gave birth to boy. It was so cold that night. She knew the baby would not survive the frigid air. So she took off all her clothes and wrapped him with them. She hugged her baby trying to keep him warm. The next morning, a missionary couple was driving their truck across that bridge when the wife exclaimed, “Stop the truck!” The truck screeched. “I hear a baby crying?” They quickly jumped out of the truck and ran under the bridge. There lay the baby wrapped in his mother’s clothes with his frozen mother dead, still with her arms around him. The couple took the baby and buried the mother nearby. They chose to adopt the baby. As the child became older he asked his adoptive parents about his mother. He wanted to know what happened to her. So the parents told him this story. The boy journeyed to this old bridge and found the place where his mother lay. He took off all his clothes and laid it on his mother’s grave. He fell to his knees and wept.
Jesus gave his life for us. Are we as grateful as this Korean boy? Are we willing to come to the cross and fall on our knees and strip off anything in our life that prevents us from serving Christ? That’s what carrying our cross is all about!
Lastly: we need to renounce all our possessions. Jesus tells us the importance of giving primacy to our relationship with God instead of our relationship with things.
There was a woman who bought a parrot in the store. She was kind of lonely so she wanted a parrot so she had someone to talk to her. So she took the parrot home and the parrot didn’t say a word. The next day she went to the store and said, “The parrot doesn’t talk.” The manager said maybe you need to get a ladder for the cage because parrots like to climb and get exercise. So she got a ladder, put it in the cage, sat there and watched the parrot – and it didn’t talk. So the next day she went back to the store and said, “OK, I got the ladder and the parrot still doesn’t talk.” He said you probably need a swing. Parrots like to swing and go back and forth; it puts them in a good mood. So she got the swing, put it in the cage, sat there and watched the parrot. The parrot didn’t talk. She went back to the store the next day and said, “I got the ladder and the swing and the parrot still doesn’t talk.” He said, “You need a mirror. A parrot likes to look at himself, so put a mirror in there.” So she gets a mirror, puts it in the cage and the parrot is just looking at himself and swinging and climbing, but not a word out of him. She went back to the manager the next day and said, “The parrot died.” He said, “The parrot died? Oh, how terrible. Did the parrot say anything before he died?” She said, “Yeah. Don’t they sell food down there? I’m hungry!”
I know all kinds of people who are hungry. They got ladders, they got swings, they got mirrors, and they got stuff. But they don’t understand that the best things in life aren’t things – that less is more. We’ve’ got to go for the simple, go for the true, go for the Eucharistic food that feeds our soul and gives us life. We’ve got to focus on deepening our relationship with God and not our desire for stuff.
No person and no thing is more important than our relationship with Jesus because it shapes, defines, determines, and characterizes all our other relationships, all other aspects of our lives; who we are, what we say, and what we do.
What costs are we willing to pay and what sacrifices are we willing to make to be disciples of Jesus? I don’t know what your answer is, but I am sure the answer will involve reordering our priorities. If we want to know what our priorities are, what drives and directs our lives, we need only look at the choices we make, what we choose to say and do, and the ways in which we spend our time, money, and energy. What do those choices say about us? Do they reflect discipleship?
Let’s not leave here the same person we were when we came in. What is one thing, large or small, that you could do or give up that changes your priorities, that reorders your relationships, that gives precedence to Christ? Choose that and you will leave here today a different person.
