The Mission of the Church: Beyond the Ties That Bind

Luke 14:25-33
The Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost 2010
(2nd in a series of 5)

“God’s mission has a church. It’s [God’s] mission, not ours. The work of the church comes out of God’s redemptive mission in the world.” That’s what Reggie McNeal, the author of a recent book titled Missional Renaissance: Changing the Scorecard for the Church, says. “God’s mission has a church. It’s [God’s] mission, not ours. The work of the church comes out of God’s redemptive mission in the world.” Last Sunday, in the first sermon in a series of five from the “travel narrative” in Luke’s gospel, I suggested that as we listen in on the teaching and preaching of Jesus as he travels from Galilee in the north to Jerusalem in the south it is as though we are overhearing directives from the home office on what kind of franchise we are at First Baptist Greenville.

Last week, in Luke 14:7-14, we overheard Jesus speak of God’s redemptive mission in the world as an open table at which are welcome persons whom we and others would otherwise exclude, ignore or abandon. And we heard Jesus speak of humility as the essential orientation in living out God’s redemptive mission in the world. This week we overhear even more challenging and difficult words of Jesus. This morning’s words are among his most offensive to our sensibilities of any in the four gospels. I was amused to see that in The Christian Century, the grand old flagship publication of mainline, ecumenical American Christianity, the preacher who contributed the meditation for this week chose to ignore the gospel lesson to reflect instead on the wonderful psalm for today that we read together as our opening sentences (Psalm 139). The funny thing is, back during the summer when I planned this series of sermons, I did the very same thing. I decided to preach on the psalm instead Jesus’ words because Jesus’ words are just too hard: “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.”

I’ve known some people like that, but I’ve never thought of them as model Christians. I’ve known some teenagers who were so unhappy with their family on any given day that they would qualify as examples of Jesus’ words. But I’ve never thought of their attitude as modeling a gospel orientation. One day in a rather heated exchange of text messages with one of my sons, I received a text from him that read, simply, “I hate you.” I assure you that when I saw that, I did not think of Luke 14:26. I did not say to myself, “O good, he’s a disciple of Jesus.” I thought he might soon meet Jesus, but I did not think he was a disciple of Jesus because he said he hated his father.

What sense does it make for Jesus to say such a thing? What sense does it make that the same Jesus who said just four chapters earlier, “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Luke 10:27), would say, “Hate the members of your own family”? What sense does it make that eight chapters earlier Jesus said not once but twice, “Love your enemies,” “Love your enemies” (Luke 6:27,35), and now he says “hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters”? Surely, the redemptive mission of God in the world is not about hating your family, is it?

Just as we did with last Sunday’s passage, let’s begin by looking at the narrative context, the place in the story that these words occur, before we try to unpack the words themselves. First, I want you to see that in verse 26 the scene changes abruptly from a Sabbath dinner at the home of a leader of the Pharisees to the journey to Jerusalem. Jesus is “on the road again.” After resting on the Sabbath, Jesus is back on his way to the showdown in Jerusalem. The second and more important thing that I want you to see in verse 26 is that Jesus’ words are directed to the “large crowds” who “were traveling with him.”

While we are considering the mission of the church, we would do well to pay attention to a fascinating difference between the attitude of Jesus toward large crowds and the American church’s attitude toward large crowds. In the American church, we associate large crowds with the success of the gospel and the church. “The bigger the better,” we say. But Jesus does not seem to share our equation of quantity and quality. Back in chapter 9:11, right before the beginning of the journey to Jerusalem, Jesus “welcomed” the crowds “and spoke to them about the kingdom of God, and healed those who needed to be cured.” But there is a subtle and important turning point in Jesus’ relationship with “the crowds” just seven verses later. We read beginning in verse 18, “Once when Jesus was praying alone, with only the disciples near him, he asked them, ‘Who do the crowds say that I am?’ They answered, ‘John the Baptist; but others, Elijah; and still others, that one of the ancient prophets has arisen.’ He said to them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’ Peter answered, ‘The Messiah of God.’ [Jesus] sternly ordered and commanded them not to tell anyone, saying, ‘The Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.’ Then he said to them all, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it. What does it profit them if they gain the whole world, but lose or forfeit themselves?’” (Luke 9:18-25). From this point on in Luke’s gospel, there is a clear distinction between “the crowds” who travel with Jesus and the “disciples” who follow Jesus.

On the journey from Galilee to Jerusalem, it becomes quite clear that Jesus is not interested in drawing crowds. Along the way, Jesus is preparing his followers to carry on his mission after his earthly ministry is over. Surprisingly, by our way of thinking, Jesus doesn’t seem to be the least bit interested in an enlargement campaign. In fact, in this morning’s gospel lesson he seems to be interested in ensmallment. In chapter 11, “the crowds were amazed” and “the crowds were increasing” (verses 14,29), and now in chapter 14 “large crowds were traveling with him” (verse 1). But instead of capitalizing on the success of his preaching and teaching and healing and ministering in drawing large crowds, he turned and delivered the hardest and most offensive sermon in Luke’s gospel. Contrary to the dominant attitude in the American church, Jesus knows that where there are large crowds there are few disciples. There are always many travelers, but there are very few followers.

The words of Jesus in front of us this morning are usually treated under the rubric “the cost of discipleship.” Actually following Jesus rather than just traveling with him will cost you. In between the costs, Jesus uses the example of a builder who fails to ensure that he has the resources available to complete a project before he begins and the king who must calculate his capacity to win a battle before entering the fight. “Count the cost,” Jesus says to the crowds. It doesn’t cost much to be a traveler, but being a follower will take everything you’ve got and then some, Jesus says. If this morning’s gospel passage has anything to say about the God’s mission for the church, it must be that being a church is not about drawing crowds but about creating followers. That’s why we do not say of First Baptist Greenville, “a community of believers, the bigger the better.” We say, “a community of believers, each member a minister.” That’s an ensmallment motto, folks. It does say, “each member just happy to be here.” It doesn’t say, “each member glad to see you.” It doesn’t say, “each member in it for what we can get out of it.” We understand our mission to be creating and being followers who will minister in Jesus’ name. Everybody’s welcome to travel, but don’t confuse travelling with following. When we merely travel, it’s all about us and what we can get out of it. When we follow, it’s about God’s redemptive mission in the world and what we can put into that.

Jesus says that following calls into question our preoccupation with family, our obsession with status, and our addiction to possessions. Those are hard words. But they are also redemptive words. They are redemptive words, and here’s why. Underlying Jesus’ hard words that call us to untie the ties that bind us to our preoccupations and obsessions and addictions, there is an offer of freedom and release, an offer to ground our lives not in things that do not last but in the everlasting God whose love for us and for the world is revealed in the life and teachings and ministry and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Let’s look at “counting the cost” in a little different way. Count the cost of putting all your eggs in the basket of your family. If your family becomes the be-all and the end-all of your existence, what happens when your children ultimately disappoint you or you lose them, literally or figuratively? If your marriage is the most important thing in the world to you, what happens when it falls apart or is willfully destroyed or your spouse dies? If your parents are your strength and stability, the glue that holds you and your family together, what happens when they are no longer around tend to you? Jesus’ hard words remind us that in spite of our culture’s preoccupation with family, family is ultimately an unstable platform on which to construct our lives and identity. Make no mistake about it, our experience in our family is vitally important to our healthy formation as human beings and our spiritual growth as followers of Jesus. But if nothing else does, our experience with grief over the loss of a loved one teaches us that family cannot be the ultimate ground of our existence. The only stable platform on which to construct our life and identity (and our family also, for that matter) is a prior relationship with God that carries us through, sustains us and preserves us in the face of whatever happens in or to our family.

The same is true of our possessions. If your happiness and your fulfillment, your sense of security and self-worth, depends on what and how much you have, then you are constructing your life on a temporary and passing platform. Reversals of fortune are inevitable. Bubble burst. Markets collapse. Incomes decline. Companies fold. Jobs disappear. Pensions evaporate. The truth is, we are so addicted to our stuff that we don’t see that our stuff controls us instead of our controlling our stuff; and Jesus says, unless you can get that addiction turned around, you can’t really follow me. Because the only stable platform on which to construct our life and identity, our happiness and fulfillment and security and self-worth is a prior relationship with God that carries us through, sustains us and preserves us in the face of whatever happens with or to our possessions.

God’s redemptive mission in the world lies beyond the ties that bind us in this world and to this world. There is no better interpretation of Jesus’ words in Luke 14:25-33 than the closing line of Martin Luther's great reformation hymn, “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God”: “Let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also; the body they may kill: God’s truth abideth still, [God’s] kingdom is forever.” The hard words of Jesus in this morning’s gospel lesson amount to a standing invitation to all who would no longer be merely travelers to become followers. The hard words of Jesus in Luke 14:25-33 amount to a standing invitation to ground your life in the only stable platform there is in all of creation, a relationship to the God who comes to us in Jesus Christ. Those invitations to God's redemptive mission in the world are open now as we stand and sing together our invitation hymn, “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God.”

This material is Copyrighted © 2010 by Jeffrey S. Rogers. It may be copied or disseminated for non-commercial use, provided this notice is included. The author can be contacted at jeffrogers110@bellsouth.net.