Hard Words

Large crowds were traveling with Jesus, and turning to them he said: "If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters-yes, even his own life-he cannot be my disciple. And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.

"Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Will he not first sit down and estimate the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it? For if he lays the foundation and is not able to finish it, everyone who see it will ridicule him, saying, 'This fellow began to build and was not able to finish' "

Luke 14:25-30

I've been reading through Luke and recently read this passage above. For the past couple days my thoughts about it have gradually been coalescing to the point that now I feel I can cogently write down some of them. My apologies if I'm mistaken. =)

So I want to share two things that really came to me while I was reading the above passage. I'll start off with the bit I'm more sure about; namely, the part about counting the cost of following Jesus before you start. I think that Christians today have a tendency to present a rose-colored picture of Christianity to non-believers. We focus on the rewards of following Jesus and de-emphasize the negative aspects. Not that I've ever heard anyone say in so many words that you'll never have any troubles once you put your trust in Christ, but the implication is there. I'd say that it's a characteristic common to anyone, including myself, who's ever tried to "sell" Christianity to someone. Rather, we try to make Christianity sound as attractive as possible. It's the way out culture teaches us to advertise. But maybe we've been going about it the wrong way all this time.

Jesus makes it clear that He expects us to submit our will (never pleasant for anyone!) to Him. He tells us time and again to expect trouble here on Earth. So why do we follow Him? Luke 18:29-30 comes to mind: "I tell you the truth," Jesus said to them, "no one who has left home or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God will fail to receive many times as much in this age and, in the age to come, eternal life". John 14:27 : "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid." But the biggest reason is that Jesus loves us as God loves Him (John 15:9), and we respond to that love. So maybe we should emphasize the unpleasant aspects of Christianity when we're evangelizing to people. Tell them that they will have troubles, that their lives will get turned upside down. Let them know they'll be pressured and hemmed and assaulted from all directions. But tell them they'll be living a life that makes a difference, and that they'll have the love and support of the maker of the universe to let them thrive during the times of trouble that will come. It's dishonest and unfair to them to let them believe otherwise.

Now that I've reached this part of the post, I've realized I was mistaken earlier when I said that I wanted to share two things about the above passage. In reality, I only wanted to share one thing directly from Luke. There's another idea that's floating around in my head, but it's only tangentially related to the passage above. Since the thought occurred to me when I was meditating on the passage, I erroneously thought it had something to do with the above passage. I see now that I was mistaken. Don't worry though, I'll bring it up again soon. I just think it needs to mature a bit more before I'm ready to share it. And I don't particularly want to delay this post until then.

See here you have it. Let me know what you think.