June 26-27, 2010
5th Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 9:51-62
Salem Lutheran Church
Sycamore, Illinois
"Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God…" And a moment later, "No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God."
I have to say, I find myself itching whenever I hear Jesus' strong words for us today. I want to argue with him, shouting that what he demands is not only not possible; it also seems wrong. And yet, what he is saying here somehow rings true deep down inside of me. Funny, but it isn't any one particular event which causes that echo within me now. Rather it's a story I read when I was in the 5th grade. One that so captured my imagination I've never forgotten it. So much so that a few years ago when browsing in an antique store in Galesburg I came upon a copy of my old reading book and I bought it.
It's called "The Cabin Faced West" and it starts like this: "Ann Hamilton swept the last of the day's dust out the door into the sunset. Even the cabin faced west, Ann thought, as she jerked the broom across the flat path the daylight made as it fell through the open doorway. It was the only place the daylight had a chance to come in. The cabin was solid logs all the way around without another opening anywhere. Its back was turned squarely against the East just as her father had turned his back. Just as her brothers David and Daniel had. "We've cast our lot with the West," her father had said as he stood in the doorway the day the cabin was completed. "And we won't look back…"
What happens next is that this young girl's two older brothers devise a punishment which will happen to anyone who so much as finds fault with the 'West.' That one would get a bucket of cold spring water on top of his or her head.
Well, the little girl in this story is ten years old. Her new life was nothing like her old one --- uprooted as she was and dropped in this new, hard place, with no friends her own age. It's a difficult adjustment. One where, at first, she is always tempted to look back… I ached for her then and I have ever since; for these almost forty years later her story stays with me, especially when I come upon Jesus' words for us now once again.
And yet her dad and older brothers are onto something. When one steps up and out into something new, looking back with second thoughts or regret, or with sadness for what can no longer be… well, in a case like this it often hurts more than it can ever help.
And so Jesus speaks today. He speaks to people, much like you and me, who find ourselves wanting to follow him… but who would at the same time, very much like to turn back, hanging on to at least some of what we've been called to leave behind. He speaks to people, perhaps much like all of us, who intend to follow Jesus more deeply, but for whom one more thing just seems to keep getting in the way. Jesus is speaking to people who perhaps, much those who still hear his words, haven't quite yet been taken hold of by the same sense of urgency that compels Jesus and his disciples forward to Jerusalem.
And to be sure, one can certainly understand anyone's hesitation in taking even that first step after Jesus. I mean, he certainly doesn't paint a very attractive picture of what is soon to come… reminding all within the sound of his voice that following him will mean having no real home… no place to lay one's head.
It's a gift to us then, to know the ending. To know that at the end of the story I read in the 5th grade, the ten year old girl had found this new place to be home in all the best ways. To know that at the end of the story --- that Jesus' journey to the cross ended in victory. It's a gift to us to know the ending, and perhaps it is sometimes that alone which carries us forward. Making us able and willing to give up what is for what will be. Urging us to set aside those obligations, large and small, which can become mere excuses for not responding to Jesus' call to simply follow him. Those things which leave us with no time or energy to pick up and answer Jesus call… And then to take those first steps so that even our fear about what will happen as a result of our doing something differently than we ever have before will soon bee a distant memory. Indeed, Jesus' words today push us to take the time to look deep – backwards and forwards at our own journey to see what's missing, what needs repair, what cries out for attention. Reminding us, perhaps, to find the time right now today to pick up the phone and reach out to one from whom we have been separated by hurt and time for too long. Urging us to check on that neighbor or to pause at the desk of a co-worker who hasn't seemed quite right to see what the matter is. Compelling us to think less about wants and more about needs: and not even especially our own, but those of a hungry, hurting world. Moving us forward with a hopeful courage which pretty soon won't have us even wanting to look back, but only looking ahead to see what's around the next bend as we seek to follow Jesus more deeply.
Probably I'll always itch some to hear Jesus' words for us today, for I know that for all of us part of following Jesus means tending, faithfully, to primary relationships… even to burying dear ones and honoring those closest to us. But once I get past the itching, I know that the call today seems to be to do even that remembering that even those most precious to us do not in and of themselves come first. They're always only part of something larger as we answer Jesus' call today… something even more important, more pressing, this call to follow Jesus, which echoes in our ears, has caught our imaginations, and has placed a hold on our hearts. Amen.