“The Road of Discipleship”
Proper 8 C (4 Pent C) –
Luke 9: 51-62
Brothers and sisters in Christ, Grace and Peace to you from the Triune God: Father Son, and Holy Spirit.
When Bob Hope died not so long ago there were many reviews of his life and career in show business that included vaudeville, radio, movies and TV. Virtually every one of these documentaries or news features included many clips from the movies that Hope made with Bing Crosby. They were called the Road Pictures because each one had the word road in the titles – the Road to
The plots of these movies always followed the same basic formula: a journey to some exotic locale filled with nefarious bad guys, beautiful women, plenty of action, and lots of songs and laughs. Many consider these films to be the original “buddy” pictures. Long before
Today’s gospel shows us the beginning of another road picture, call it the Road to
“When the days drew near for Jesus to be taken up . . .” refers to Jesus be taken up on the cross. And the words “he set his face to go to
For the disciples, and for us, this journey is perhaps best called the Road to, or of, discipleship. There is an ongoing conversation between Jesus and his disciples in this gospel. But it is not funny, it is not witty repartee between two show biz pros. Discipleship is a matter of death and life for all of us. And this text gives us an ultra-realistic picture of Jesus and what we say ‘Yes’ to when we call Him Lord.
The realistic picture of Jesus is of a leader/servant going about teaching and guiding the disciples and those who come up to him wanting to become disciples. We hear Jesus preparing them for the road to
Sometimes he comes across as almost testy and cranky here. Kind of like a drill sergeant, with noticeable snap in his voice, “Let the dead bury their own dead, but as for you go and proclaim the
That is the picture of Jesus. What about the disciples and the wannabe disciples? What about us? I am afraid the picture is not pretty. There is a reason Jesus takes the tone he does in these readings.
What we see are a type of disciple that I’ll call “but” disciples, don’t let you mind run away, that’s but B-U-T as in but first let me say farewell to those at my home” or “But first let me bury my father.” Jesus’ responses to these BUT disciples is harsh because when it comes to being a disciple of Christ, “but” is an open door through which sin, death and the devil walk into our hearts.
Jesus clearly expects much from his disciples. Do we expect as much of our brothers and sisters in Christ? Do we expect as much of ourselves? William Willimon tells the story of a congregation he served that had started an evangelism program to the local neighborhood. After six months they’d made good progress and brought in quite a few new members.
At a meeting to evaluate their efforts to date, a woman named Gladys said she was troubled. Something bothers me about all this, she said. Here we go knocking on neighbors’ door, urging them to come to our church, but what are we inviting them to? We tell them we have a great youth program, that we will do this or that for their children. We have great summer activities, a fall picnic. We have pastoral counseling, good music, great preaching. In other words, we have all these services to meet your needs, to entertain you, to care for your kids, and to fix what’s wrong with your life. Seems like I remember somewhere it says, “Take up your cross and follow me,” Gladys said.
To which our gospel adds, “No buts about it!!!”
Willimon says that the evangelism committee sat silent as they remembered that discipleship, Christian discipleship is something else than what Gladys had been listing. How in the world, Willimon says, do we call people to Jesus by appealing to their needs, their selfishness, their ‘what’s in it for us’ attitude?
Or do we call people to Jesus by appealing to their love for the neighbor, the hungry, the needy? Do we call people to Jesus by living as disciples of the living God, the Word made flesh, the God who asks much and gives everything?
Way back in 1983, just a few months after the first IBM PCs came on the market, I worked as a contract writer for a startup company in
I was listening one day to John Stearns, the CEO, talk about the difficulties of being a successful startup in such a competitive, even cutthroat business. The risks are huge, he said. The opportunities for failure are great. Then Stearns said something that was not original to him, but it was the first time I had heard it. And it has stuck with me these 20 plus years. He said, “You can always tell who the pioneers, the leaders are -- they are the ones with the arrows in their chest.”
Two years and a chest full of arrows later, Stearns Computer Systems was no more. Two of Stearns competitors in the PC clone business are still around. You might recognize their names: Dell and Compaq.
But what I remember fondly about that little company that couldn’t, was not they failed where others succeeded. It was that they took the risk, no buts about it. And that out of their failure, other start-up companies were born who did survive and prosper. The death of Stearns was far from the end of the story.
What Jesus is challenging us to do in today’s gospel, what Gladys was reminding her evangelism committee of was that instead that if we are to be disciples ourselves, if we are to call others to be disciples of Jesus Christ, we need to be clear that, not a chest full of arrows, but a cross is part of the journey. A cross is the destination. The good news in today’s gospel is that we do not make the journey alone. The good news is that we follow in the footsteps of the one who has set his face toward Jerusalem and who accepts no ifs, no buts, only obedience.
The good news is that the one we follow is Hope. Not Bob Hope on the Road to Bali, but Hope incarnate on the road to Jerusalem. Hope that conquers death on the cross so that as well shoulder our cross and bear the burdens -- and joy -- of discipleship, we can do so in the hope and expectation of life eternal and peace that passes all understanding.
The grand old hymn says Softly and Tenderly Jesus is calling. Today Jesus calls you sternly, even harshly, his demands seem impossible, crazy even. But whether he calls tenderly or harshly, the call is the same. The destination and the journey are the same -- the road to Jerusalem is also the road of discipleship. And you can tell who the disciples are: they’re the ones with the crosses on their back
Will you walk that road with me?
Amen.
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