FINDINGS II
Proper
8 - C - June 27, 2010
2d Kings 2: 1-2, 6-14 and Luke 9: 51-62
By Harry T. Cook 6/21/10
RUBRIC
The theme is following; the verb, "to follow." The idea is
that an invitation of great consequence may come only once, at least with that
first sunburst of new opportunity. Then it is not enough to say, "Not now.
Later. I have other things to do." Or as Luke quotes Jesus saying to the
interested but still reluctant, "No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks
back is fit for the realm of God," i.e. for the rule of others above self, of
unconditional love of enemy as well as neighbor, of permanent willingness to
walk a second mile, to take off the shirt as well as the coat and give it away,
of all that countercultural behavior that may mark one as an unredeemable eccentric
otherwise known as a disciple of Jesus. The ones who wanted to bury their dead got it. They knew
they might not come back. Thus it was as well for those who wanted to bid
farewell to family. That hesitation was the natural human desire to cling to
important relationships and what must be done to maintain them in loving and
accountable ways. That is the crossroads at which would-be disciples ever
stand: between the past and present that are known and comfortable, and the
future that is unsure and therefore threatening. One either goes, or does not
go. Robert Frost said he took the road less traveled by, and it made all the
difference. Luke says Jesus "set his face to go to Jerusalem," and any way one
looks at the story that unfolds from there, a great difference was made.
WORKSHOP
Chapter 9, verse 51 is the point of departure for Luke's
Jesus as he begins what over the next almost 10 chapters (to 18:36) will be his
second journey to Jerusalem, the first accounted for in Luke 2:22-51. Mark and
Matthew more or less follow suit on the single Jerusalem trip of the adult
Jesus. The Gospel of John deals with elapsed time in different framework in
which Jesus makes not one but three trips to Jerusalem. Luke's itinerary for Jesus will sometimes seem to illustrate
Zeno's paradox because here and there it seems to stall and almost terminate.
But here at 9:51, Luke makes certain that readers know how fateful the journey
will turn out to be and how clearly Jesus seemed to know it. Of Jesus, Luke
says in v. 51 that he (literally) "set his face stiffly" toward Jerusalem.
Think here of a set jaw, a look of utter determination mixed with anxiety over
what may await him there. The author of Luke was certainly not a witness to
whatever Jesus' last days may have held, but it is captured here with what
surely must have been the emotional content of them. Ch. 9, vv. 51-56 are unique with no clear parallels in Mark
or Matthew. For Luke, the way from Galilee would go through Samaria to which
Jesus sent messengers (aggeloi) perhaps to set up camp for the night or to
arrange lodging. The running feud between North and South, with which Luke
subsequently deals in 10: 30-37 (The Good Samaritan), intervenes to keep Jesus
on the move (see 9:53). James and John evidently believed they had power
similar to that which Elijah is depicted as using to embarrass the prophets of
Baal (see 1st Kings 18). The two asked Jesus if they might torch the
Samaritans' houses and them as well. Perhaps Luke depicts Jesus as rejecting
such a course of action in order to distinguish Jesus from John the Baptist and
Elijah, both of whom were fiery reformers. Matthew and Luke share the next scene in which a person
approaches Jesus in the course of the journey to volunteer discipleship (v.
57). For Matthew, it is a scribe; for Luke simply "someone." "I will follow you wherever you go," the person says.
In
echoes of Luke 9: 21-26, Luke's Jesus says to the person that the thing to
which he wishes to sign on comes with the assurance of serious deprivation, viz.
no permanent bed of one's own. To yet another would-be disciple (in Matthew
that other person is already a disciple), Jesus lays down the challenge:
"Follow me." And as if to prove that discipleship will always cost more than
most can bear, Luke has the prospective disciple ask to defer his commitment
until a dead father can be buried. In both Luke and Matthew, Jesus is made to say, "Let the
dead bury their own dead." Much has been written about this proverb-like
saying. It may have meant in Luke's time something like, "Those who have not
answered the call are as good as dead. May as well bury them." To the one who wants to follow but only after he goes home
to say farewell, Jesus is made to say: "No one who first puts his hand to the
plow and then looks back is fit material for the rule of God." In other words,
the one doing the plowing must keep his eye fixed on the ground before him if
he will plow a straight and usable furrow. Pushing a plow forward whilst
looking backward would be a sign of ineptness and stupidity. With that gauntlet laid down, Jesus, with a face set in
determined lines, is off to Jerusalem and to whatever it has to offer. He has
set his hand to the plow, and he will not look back, much less go back.
HOMILETIC COMMENTARY The trouble with most of contemporary Christianity is that
its path takes one down the road most frequently traveled. It is rutty and
predictable from long and repeated use. It leads to nowhere in particular at
low to no cost. One can take it or leave it, and there is not much difference
either way. For that reason alone, there is not much hope that a study session
or homily on this text will be more than an academic exercise, and probably a
fairly low-wattage one at that. That is because the prophetic lineaments of the
Jewish-Christian stream of thought are frequently treated as a matter of history rather
than a call to action in the present. Beneath the pious veneer of the gospels lies the story of a
first-century subversive movement not unlike what Mohandas Gandhi's would turn
out to be in the first half of the 20th century: one of passive resistance that
made the authorities crazy. The movement that grew up around the
countercultural ethical wisdom attributed to a "Jesus of Nazareth" was not a
military one and not, in ordinary terms, a political one. It was made up of
people who were trying to live with each other and the world according to the
terms of Hillel's and Jesus' Golden Rule of not treating others as one would
not want to be treated, of people who were bound and determined to love their
enemies into friends, of people geared up to turn the other cheek to the
smiter. But the effect was a political one, and Rome tried to quash it and
succeeded after a fashion. One objects, saying, "The Christian church is alive and well
today. So Rome did not succeed."
Really? It will have succeeded beyond its wildest dreams
unless and until those who would be disciples of Jesus as he is depicted in the
gospels set their faces en masse toward the seat of power, there to insist by
example on peace instead of war and on distributive rather than retributive
justice. As a veteran of the civil rights and antiwar movements of
the last half-century, I can tell you that passive insistence, like passive
resistance, is carried out at a price. Those who are already essentially dead
from their repetitive journeys down the well-known, spirit-numbing road oft taken
need fear no more than a nominal cost for doing so -- save burial in the
minutiae of routine. The road less traveled by takes one to his own Jerusalem
where awaits the establishment that is sure to strike back at passive
insistence. There's one other reason why one, having first put his hand
to the plow, should not look back. Often enough, he will find himself alone.
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