Now large crowds were traveling with him, and he turned and said to them, “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. Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, saying, “This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.” Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? If he cannot, then while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.
Grace to you from the Mystery in whom we live and breathe and have our being.
So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.
harsh words
My father used to read the bible to us kids before bedtime. It was never a forced event. It was part of an evening ritual where my dad would read age-appropriate stories and discuss them with us. Since I was the youngest by several years, I was probably already in bed when this took place.
I sincerely doubt Dad read this text on hating mother and father to us, or asked us to choose between our parents and God. Can you imagine a parent saying, “Kids, it’s one or the other, and if you make a choice other than devotion to God and hating us, you will be cut off forever! Furthermore, give up all your possessions!” So why would Jesus do such a thing?
Maybe Jesus misspoke. Perhaps he hadn’t rehearsed his words or received feedback. Maybe like me, it was just an impulsive moment.
Perhaps Jesus didn’t expect some theologians would dismiss his harsh words as mere hyperbole. Or that future cults would use these scriptures to control their followers’ allegiance. To plumb the depths of Jesus’ hyperbole, like a Jewish midrash, will paradoxically broaden the avenues of love of “father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself.”
form of translation
To interpret these scriptures literally would be the lowest form of translation.
Why would Jesus say we must hate the only things in life we deeply love? Maybe that’s just it. Perhaps he is touching on the deepest attachments that take God’s place. Many attachments, no matter how lovely and precious, can become idols. They become possessions gripped so firmly that we do not live with receptive, open hands.
To be a learner, a pupil of Jesus is more than just following. It is about emptying prior assumptions and biases to make room for the radical nature of love.
Jesus said, “Give up all your possessions…” In Greek, the word possession used is hyparcho. It means ‘to be’, to start a new beginning’, to exist.’ No wonder the word ‘possessions can trip us up in the scriptures. Rather than seeing possessions as stuff we own, perhaps we ought to see them as attachments that attempt to own and define who we are. Holding on to attachments prevents us from living the Imago Dei life, living in the image of God.
god has us
You see, we don’t have God. God has us. We were and are encompassed by the immanent and transcendent God of irrevocable belonging.
For years, discipleship training seemed to be more about possessing God and behaving in a certain way.
One example of today’s fundamentalist/evangelical discipleship organizations has, for many years, built a worldwide influence on the Christian religious identity of children. They’re goal has been to shape the identity of children into “resilient disciples.”
Their philosophy is 1. Belong: Create an environment where children feel like they belong. 2. Believe: Create a competition on scripture memorization where rewards are given for the perfect reciting of the bible and
3. Become: “approved workmen who are not ashamed.”
An alarming number of patients attended this organization’s discipleship as children.
You might think I’m being harsh on my fellow Christians, but since 1980, I have worked with and spoken to hundreds of men and women in treatment centers who have suffered at the hands of unnecessary religious guilt. For many years, I worked with them in treatment for disordered eating and mental health issues.
I was once asked to come to the Quad Cities area, which had a huge epidemic of Christian women and adolescents suffering from anorexia. To speak on the life-giving message of irrevocable belonging. In the region, there were and still are many fundamentalist/evangelical churches and colleges.
Their deep desire to please God made them vulnerable to shame. Whether intentional or not, performance and perfection were expected, and their autonomy was stripped. Many of them chose Christian colleges. The expectations of self were high, and in silence, they turned on themselves by withholding food, cutting, and masking their own okayness. They became unapproved workmen and ashamed. Are these profoundly influential groups there to pick up the pieces for the innocent lives who learned belonging is earned and that believing was a transaction between them and God?
give away what possesses us
Perhaps Jesus had to go to this extent to demonstrate the utter necessity of giving away what possesses us and following God with imaginative wonder and freedom. To accept the identity of God’s unconditional love and remember our intrinsic belonging. It is who we are
What would happen if we changed the translation for possession to identity? Let’s try it.
“So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all that you have made to be your identity” (v 33).
It is the way of transformation.
To belong is irrevocable. (truth)
To believe is to trust that I belong. (transformed thoughts)
To behave is the fruit of believing that I belong. (actions)
Amen
Psalm 139:1-5, 12-17
1 Lord, you have searched me out and known me;
you know my sitting down and my rising up;
you discern my thoughts from afar.
2 You trace my journeys and my resting-places
and are acquainted with all my ways.
3 Indeed, there is not a word on my lips,
but you, O Lord, know it altogether.
4 You press upon me behind and before
and lay your hand upon me.
5 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
it is so high that I cannot attain to it.
12 For you yourself created my inmost parts;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
13 I will thank you because I am marvelously made;
your works are wonderful, and I know it well.
14 My body was not hidden from you,
while I was being made in secret
and woven in the depths of the earth.
15 Your eyes beheld my limbs, yet unfinished in the womb;
all of them were written in your book;
they were fashioned day by day,
when as yet there was none of them.
16 How deep I find your thoughts, O God!
how great is the sum of them!
17 If I were to count them, they would be more in number than the sand; *
to count them all, my life span would need to be like yours.
Wednesday Respite is a 30-min contemplative service of scripture, prayer, music and a Spirited Touchpoint by Henry Rojas, spiritual director at Spirit in the Desert.
Touchpoint is a reflection on where God’s story touches our life story. It is a short homily based on a biblical story of people in the Old and New Testaments and their relationship with God. Our spiritual ancestors’ experience of God’s grace connects with our lives in the present and our relationship with the Divine. Previous Touchpoints are available as PDFs or on SoundCloud.
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