John Michael Gutiérrez, PhD

The Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Luke

11 Now on his way to Jerusalem, Jesus traveled along the border between
Samaria and Galilee. 12 As he was going into a village, ten men who had leprosy
met him. They stood at a distance 13 and called out in a loud voice, “Jesus,
Master, have pity on us!” 14 When he saw them, he said, “Go, show yourselves
to the priests.” And as they went, they were cleansed. 15 One of them, when he
saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice. 16 He threw
himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him—and he was a Samaritan. 17 Jesus
asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? 18 Has no one
returned to give praise to God except this foreigner?” 19 Then he said to him,
“Rise and go; your faith has made you well.

Luke 17:11-19

The Gospel of the Lord
17 chapters into Luke’s Gospel lots of bits and bobs are stacking up. This
morning’s healing scene is the second time he’s featured a dreaded skin disease
(5.12-16) and a dreaded Samaritan (10.25-37).

In the last few years Americans have experienced disease circumstances never
known to them before. And in typical American style words/phrases have been
created to control everyday life: shelter in place, flatten the curve, social
distancing and that sign on every door – masks mandatory.
Along with Lennon/McCartney, Sting, and Bob Dylan, Paul Simon is one of the all
time great songwriters. For songwriters a satire of one of their songs is one of the
all time great tributes. Simon wrote “50 Ways to leave your Lover” in 1975. I don’t
have one of my guitars or amps this morning so I’ll read you just a few lines from
a wonderful satire of his song making the rounds. “The problem is all inside your
head”, she said to me. “The answer is easy if you listen carefully, I’d like to help
you in your struggle to be free, There must be 50 ways to catch the virus: Stay
away from the pack, Jack; Don’t visit your gran, Stan, Wipe down every toy, Roy,
Stop touching your face, Grace, Keep back six feet, Pete. I’ll repeat myself at the
risk of being rude, there must be 50 ways to catch corona in your food”.

You catch the point. Well to the text.

Let’s start with this first bit of information before we get into the scene itself “On
the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the border between Samaria and
Galilee” (vs. 11). That’s about 57 mi. or the distance from Tustin to Six Flags
Magic Mountain. But six chapters ago near the same Samaria/Galilee border
Luke told us “… as the days were being fulfilled for his ascension, Jesus set his
face toward Jerusalem” (9.51-52). Jesus seems to have taken zero steps of
those 57 miles. On the other hand, in contrast to Jesus, Luke has taken some big
theological steps since Ch. 9. First, Luke has edited small stories into a “final road
trip” to convey Jesus’ determination to go to Jerusalem to suffer, die and be
raised from the dead. These recorded events happened. They were done for us
and were given to us. The Gospel’s saving healing is a gift. Turn around and
receive it. Second, Luke also edited the “ final road trip” to convey discipleship,
its commitment, its choices. God has acted in Jesus’ life, crucifixion and
resurrection. But there’s a difference between the crowds and the disciples. Do
you trust Jesus enough to build your life on Him? Will you choose to follow Him
as a disciple?

Now Luke, like all good writers such as Melville, Hemingway, Sinclair Lewis, C.S.
Lewis, knows how to weave together the final threads of his story into a cord. So
Luke’s not writing a travelog for Rick Steves. But skilled writer that he is, he will
slide geographical landscapes into social and spiritual scenery down the road. As
he brings the “road trip” to an end, it’s important for aspiring disciples to deal with
the ideas he’s edited. In other words, there’s woven threads in the stories. We
call them themes. And it’s important for me/us to take hold of the woven cord if
we’re going to be a disciple.

Well back to the text.

Jesus is coming down a path about to enter a village when Luke blocks his path
with “10 men who had leprosy” not “10 lepers”(vs. 12). Why not 10 lepers?
Because for Luke their humanity is the issue; leprosy is merely a skin condition.
Apparently the 10 didn’t listen carefully and are now in quarantine, sent away to
live on their own for more than 10 days. In the Biblical dictionary the word for
leprosy is like a long hallway of high school lockers. It refers to skin conditions –
everything from acne, to psoriasis, to actual leprosy. Skin diseases are
considered contagious. The basics for quarantine are found in the Sinai Covenant
(Lev. 13-14). The fine print moves the 10 men to the margins of cities, towns and
villages away from social/religious life. Once insiders they’re outsiders.

Beneath this disease scene lies another sickness. After some time in Israel’s
history, dreaded skin diseases became parade ground examples of sin – the
distortion, the violation of the Lord’s will and well being for the proper ordering of
human life. Real suffering is not from diseased or crépy skin, most certainly not
from Covid-19 but from sin. Sin is a rebellion, a moral violation, separating a
person from the Lord and others. Like but unlike some sickness it spreads totally
through us wreaking havoc. It spoils our life. Sin is serious. It’s never fashionable
with iPhones, skinny jeans and tattoos except in American media and
entertainment. And in this Gospel, there is only one cure – seeking forgiveness,
mercy from the only person who can make you whole physically and spiritually –
Jesus walking the road to the cross.

The 10 men, coming as close as social distancing will allow, call out in a loud
voice, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us!” (vs. 12b-13), a title used only by the
closest of disciples (5.5, 8.24, 45, 9.33, 49, 17.13). They plead for mercy, that is,
healing. “Keeping their distance” we might expect Luke to write Jesus heard the
men. But instead Luke writes he “sees” the men. Although his face is “set toward
Jerusalem” (9:51), he is not so preoccupied with his own objective he cannot
take time to see others. But what Jesus saw was close enough to be touched by
them. Why? Because the close reader of Luke knows Jesus knows people’s
physical pain, their emotional confusion, the hurt of rejection and sin’s
devastating experience.

How do we know this? Well, because from the very beginning of his public
ministry Jesus has been committed to using Holy Spirit radar to guide him toward
people in pain “Unrolling the Isaiah scroll in Nazareth’s synagogue, Jesus found
the place where it was written, ‘God’s Spirit is on me; he’s chosen me to preach
the Message of good news to the poor, Sent me to announce pardon to prisoners
and recovery of sight to the blind, To set the burdened and battered free, to
announce, This is God’s time to shine!” (4.17-19). And I will ask you to listen
carefully to the Isaiah scroll again. Listen carefully as the Spirit guides the
Servant Jesus into experiences like these 10 men “spurned and distanced from
human society, he was a man who suffered, pain was his close companion, like
one who must hide his face from us, he was despised, we held him of no
importance, and yet, those were our sufferings that weighed on him, our pains
were the burden he bore, we counted him smitten by God, we counted him struck
down by God, we counted him humiliated by God, but he was pierced for our
rebellion, he was crushed for our misdeeds, his burden was the suffering that
made us whole, he endured the pain that brought us healing (53.2-5)
Pain/sickness united ten men into a community at the borders. Now
pain/sickness unites them to Jesus at the borders. I have and do experience
much pain and heartache in my life. It makes me feel like I’m at the borders, at
wits end. Nothing gets my attention like pain. Nothing opens me up to the need
for hope like pain. Where is your pain today? Is it a breaking heart, a breaking
body? Grief or regret because something was said or done that cost a
relationship with someone? In my/your pain know this: Jesus stands on, actually
blocks the path in front of me/you. My hope is that a church, this church, would
do the same. The mission of the church isn’t a weekly adopt a highway program
but a community walking in the borderlands, looking for outsiders to bring Jesus
the savior, the healer to those experiencing physical, emotional, social and
spiritual pain. Luke says to the disciples and the Church: It might seem awkward
for you to show up, to set aside emotional, social or spiritual distancing and step
in close to another person’s pain. But it’s probably Jesus’ Holy Spirit radar
bringing you in close. Keep your eyes open.

Jesus merely says to the 10 men, “Go, Let the priests “see” (vs. 14, Lev. 14.2ff).
Because not only were priests Temple personnel in Jerusalem and Mt. Gerizim,
they were also public health officials. But here’s the point: It’s taken true trust and
hope in God’s mercy for these 10 marginalized men to let Jesus see them. It will
take truer trust and hope for these 10 marginalized men to let priests see them.
Luke says to the disciples and the Church: It will take even truer trust and hope
in God’s compassion for even one person to let you see them. Keep your eyes
open.

Well back on the road again.

Luke tells us the 10 men did as they’re told. They believed they would be healed.
And, indeed, as they travel they are healed (vs. 14b). Luke sees one of the 10
men, “seeing” he had been healed doesn’t continue on but “disobediently”, so to
speak, turns back to let Jesus see him. He expresses his thankfulness, falling at
Jesus’ feet in an act of worship (vs. 16a). This is the miracle of ‘seeing’ declared
in Nazareth’s synagogue. The man’s eyes have been opened to what God has
for him. He gets it. Can’t you hear him say: Jesus saw me when no one else did.
He saw me at the borders. Jesus the Spirit guided outsider has come for me, an
outsider. He saw me in my pain, my physical, social and sinful separation. Words
I know all too well.

Now this is fascinating. Both Luke and Jesus want us to sympathize with the
man. Right? But notice how they do it. Put yourself in his cloths, bandages for a
moment. See your skin freed of disease. But listen to what you hear? First,
there’s Luke’s jaw-dropping “he was a Samaritan”(vs. 16b). Followed
immediately by Jesus’ equally sharp “Were not ten made clean? But the other
nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God
except this “foreigner”? (vs. 17-18). Naming him “Samaritan” and “foreigner”,
pushes him even further out toward social/religious borders. Because of his
heritage, he was already across the border even without his sickness.
Samaritans lived on the other side of the border. They should keep out of the
country. No path to citizenship for these folk. But these ‘brand name’ borders
erected by cultural/religious builders are pretty porous. This is not a battle for
borders. Jesus isn’t interested in the divisive nationalistic politics about borders
or immigration. What Jesus is interested in is the “seeing” of men, women,
children in the dire conditions and desperate circumstances of borderland life.
Jesus is interested in the radical, transforming compassion of the Spirit healing
anyone found in borderlands.

Luke has woven threads into a cord “at the border of Samaria and Galilee”. Any
borders between who might be healed – leper, Samaritan, Jew or Gentile, have
been crossed by the saving mission of Jesus. But there’s this also. There is no
doubt something to be understood about people who live at the margins of
communities, who are treated as invisible or unlovely because of how they look
or who they are or where they come from. Perhaps, we could insert here the
chronically ill, the chronically disabled by war, the working poor, the politically
correct ‘migrant’ for Hispanic or the homeless. Any of these will do. But in a rush
to “brand name” we too often overlook Luke’s identification: 10 men who had
leprosy (vs. 12). We too often forget there are men and women, human beings,
in those names. Men and women, who have hopes and fears. Men and women
who, in the dark of night, in the loneliness of the night, shed tears on pillows over
the future of themselves and their children. I suppose Gospel scenes like this led
MLK to formulate his hope that the day would come when men and women
would be judged by the content of their character not the color of their skin or
ethnicity. So I would suggest to you Luke says to the disciples and the church:
Jesus clearly “sees” them, cares about them. Sanctity of life and wellbeing are
most important. Get into the “borderlands”. Behave like him. Keep your eyes
open.

The Samaritan’s return allows Jesus to demonstrate, to teach no one is beyond
Jesus’ sight. In the words “Your faith has freed you from disease” Jesus acts with
the authority of the Temples (vs. 19). We too often use “faith” to mean
“intellectual agreement” and “saved” to mean “saved from sins/hell so you can go
to heaven”. But it’s better to think along biblical lines. “Faith” means entering the
full healing Jesus offers; “freed” is acknowledging a spiritual, physical, emotional,
social wholeness. Anyone can experience this kind of healing. There’s depth to
healing because it’s the touch of Jesus’ Spirit . And the man’s return for an act of
worship heals his soul. The Lord, in the borders of Samaria and Galilee, has
healing. And the depth of that healing is available to anyone who calls out for
mercy at their borders. Luke says to the church: Keep your eyes open.

And, in the end, Jesus tells him “go home”, return to your family, work, village …
your life. Whenever you come to a Gospel scene like this you should consider
where it fits into your life. Maybe like me, you’ve realized recently we’ve let
ourselves go in a way that pushed us to the boundaries of relationships or that
we shouldn’t have given ourselves over to people, things, ideas that have taken
us to the margins where spiritual resources are scarce, barren cold places. At
some point we’ve realized we’re in pain, sick, lost and lonely far from where we
should be. And we don’t know our way back. But Jesus the healer stands before
me/you. He’s come looking for me/you. He has healing equal to our cry for help,
to our confusion. He knows about all the wrong choices we’ve made to get us
where we are. Don’t be anxious about the wrong turns we’ve made, the ridiculous
foolish things. He knows the deep disease of sin and how to cure it. The Gospel
has platformed confession, reconciliation, hope and forgiveness. It’s real. It can
bring diseased, sinful people to Jesus, the healer. The Spirit power of the Gospel
absolves, heals the impact of sickness and sin raising me/you to new life.
Jesus saw us from the cross. And he will act for our healing because of the
resurrection/ascension. He brings us healing, making us whole. Through the
“disobedient worship” of the Samaritan, we are invited to reflect on how the
fullness of what “saved” or “freed” might mean for us. And there, may it be that by
acknowledging him as Master and experiencing his healing, we will find in
ourselves an outpouring of worship. There are many here in this morning’s
service who have walked in the borderlands. Many have acknowledged him as
Master and been healed. Ask most anyone. We do ‘see’ you and we do rejoice in
healing.

May the Lord richly bless you my beloved.

John Michael Gutiérrez, PhD

The Holy Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ according to Luke

1 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. 2 And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, “This man receives sinners and eats with them.” 3 So he told them this parable: 4 “What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it? 5 And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. 6 And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ 7 Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. 8 “Or what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it? 9 And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.’ 10 Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”

[11 And he said, “There was a man who had two sons. 12 And the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.’ And he divided his property between them. 13 Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living. 14 And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. 15 So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. 16 And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything. 17 “But when he came to himself, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger! 18 I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. 19 I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.”’ 20 And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. 21 And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ 22 But the father said to his servants, ‘Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. 23 And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. 24 For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’ And they began to celebrate. 25 “Now his older son was in the field, and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. 26 And he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. 27 And he said to him, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf, because he has received him back safe and sound.’ 28 But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, 29 but he answered his father, ‘Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might celebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!’ 31 And he said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32 It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.’”]

Luke 15:1-32

The Gospel of the Lord

When I returned from England last century, I began teaching the Biblical Languages. The first Biblical Literature I taught was Luke-Acts. Luke and I have “history” so to speak. When Luke edited his Gospel for Theophilus – remember his introduction in ch. 1 (vs. 1-4), he placed three parables in a sequence: a parable about a wandering sheep, a parable about a misplaced coin and a parable about two equally lost sons (15.1-32). And notice all three have a similar pattern: (1) a crisis where something/someone is lost from a larger group, (2) an action where the leading character seeks out and finds the lost, (3) the finder then invites friends for a celebration and (4) Jesus makes a comment. So here’s my dilemma. In this morning’s Gospel lesson, the lectionary editors have us read only two of the parables. Twenty four weeks ago, we read Luke’s third parable, commonly called the prodigal son, on the fourth Sunday in Lent.  You’ll find Luke’s edit  printed in full in this morning’s  bulletin. Because as I began to prepare for this morning, I kept running up against his edit.  So I’ll ask for your forgiveness beforehand, since I will return to the entire scene of his final edit.

A first thought about Luke’s introduction in vs. 1-2: Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. But the Pharisees and Scribes complained, “This man too freely puts his arms around sinners and eats with them.”. Remember in Luke’s Gospel Jesus is presented to the Jewish leaders in a prophetic role. The dominant role of Israel’s prophets is appeal. So in the pattern of the classical prophets, here’s how I imagine the prophet Jesus speaking to the religious authorities. He has his forearms stretched out and the palms of his hands turned up. He wants to embrace them. He is inviting them to consider three kinds of lost-ness and to not let their identification ideology lose sight of people in their real lives. There are lots of ways to be lost. Not only three. And if you’re a frequent visitor to Israel’s prophetic literature then you’ll not be surprised by creativity.   

As I’ve said previously, one of my favorite Jewish teachers Amy-Jill Levine observes parables are meant “to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable.”  She writes, “if we hear a parable and think, ‘I really like that’ or, worse, fail to take any challenge, we are not listening well enough”. Luke’s edited intentions for Theophilus are subtle. So sometimes Wisdom can help. Parables belong to Israel’s Wisdom Literature so we know they’re multi-directional. Right off, these parables involve ideas of lost-ness and attitudes. And because they’re Wisdom Literature, they  lead everyone on a collision course with choices, decisions, responsiveness, forgiveness and changes in direction. A lot of attention focuses on: How do we read them? Who do we identify with? What will it take to get us involved? So from these questions we know the parables are not an all out attack on Scribes and Pharisees. But we do know this: the parables involve them just as much as everyone because the question in vs. 4 cleverly begins “Who among you….”?

The first parable focuses on a wandering sheep (vs. 3-7). This one sheep out of the 99 wasn’t a wild sheep but belonged to the flock from the beginning. Sheep wander. Jewish believers wander. Christian believers wander. Wandering is merely one of the things believers are most consistent at. Believers are complicated. Sometimes they never meant to wander away. They drifted away without knowing it. It’s taken the same amount of divine mercy to get them, me and you saved and grace to keep all of us saved. But the point is there’s a learning curve to living a believing life. Some are lambs, some are sheep. Not one among the flock, the community, is at the same point of obedience or faithfulness. Everyone, tax collectors, sinners, disciples, scribes and Pharisees, wander from faithfulness in different ways. Everyone encounters struggles with keeping focused. Knowing this, it takes a lot of grace to live as a wanderer in a flock with other wanderers.   

It’s been my great privilege to have a teaching vocation as a lamb, a sheep. For you see I’ve been involved in teaching men/women who want to be ordained shepherds. I have no ordained authority. If I have any authority it’s merely persuasion. I’ve spoken to them about the Bible and ministry as a sheep who knows wandering well. I’ve wanted them to know and understand how a sheep like me experiences the pasture, the wilderness. I’ve wanted them to know I’m not unaware of the experiences, the pains, the feelings of failure in my own life. And thank you Jesus there’s a better model for shepherding than a top down administration with cost benefit analysis of a one percent loss. Jesus has a place on his shoulders for even one wandering believer. 

From the very first time I sang the words of this Methodist revival hymn, even until today, they lay heavy on my soul: “Prone to wander, Lord I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love. Jesus sought me when a stranger, wandering from the fold of God. He, to rescue me from danger, interposed His precious blood. O to grace how great a debtor daily I’m constrained to be. Let thy goodness like a fetter bind my wandering heart to thee. Here’s my heart, O take and seal it. Seal it for Thy courts above”.  It’s not about bureaucracy, programs, not about balance sheets. A believer’s life is challenging, hopeful and difficult. Shepherding ministry is knowing intimately what’s happening in the flock, the local community. Like Jesus with his open arms toward Scribes and Pharisees, I’ve wanted the aspiring shepherds to carefully know, to personally consider, to generously serve folk with instruction, compassion and kindness. If you’re going to search for wanderers then you will have to find them where they gather in their lost-ness. There you will find them trying to find something to satisfy, to deaden the pain of an empty heart. And when you find them, lay them on your shoulders rejoicing as Jesus did. What this means is: help them, undertake for them, assume some care for them, share your strength with them. This is what the Scribes/Pharisees, who thought of themselves as part of the 99, were supposed to do. Hopefully it stung some of them. It was always my prayer that it stung my aspiring shepherds.

The next parable focuses on another kind of lost-ness. A woman panics after misplacing a coin in her house (vs. 8-10). The coin was part of her life. It belonged to her. She uses a costly item – an oil lamp in her desperate search. I certainly, and perhaps you, walk around with lots of doubts about myself. And when I lose or misplace something or someone especially at home I feel it. And don’t I feel stoooopid – that’s four o’s in the spelling!  Sometimes stupid is all I’ve got! But there are ways to find what has been lost. I can do this one thing. I can admit I made a mistake. Admit it’s my fault. I can be more helpful to the household if I lighten up, uncovering with honesty my mistakes. I can, as it were, pull back the carpet and start sweeping in one corner, pull out the refrigerator from the cabinet, and move carefully across the room. She realized she would be working in darkness. She needed more light. Like her, I need the good, synagogue goin’ Scribe/Pharisee to hold the candle and not tell me what five steps I should have done to manage my wealth. Or to put it into Scribe/Pharisee speak “If you’d only fully obey the Tradition of the Elders such things wouldn’t happen”. Well, they do happen because things happen.

One time in my life, I lost someone. It was soccer season. Jason had practice on Tuesdays after school. I always came to fetch him after practice so we could go get dinner. Well, one thing after another went wrong that day. I was delayed. When I got to the practice field, I discovered it was empty, completely empty.  I remember the panic. My arms went numb; my mouth was dry and my head was pounding. May I suggest something of that panic is what we read in this parable. Like the woman, in a frenzy I dropped everything and rushed to different houses. At the third, thank God, there he was! Saying over and over I was so very sorry, I held him ever so tightly in my arms. He hadn’t been kidnapped. He hadn’t been left behind, unnoticed. A lot of things were held at arm’s length. Although, from time to time he wanted a Baskin Robbins ice cream reminding me the whole story hasn’t been told – YET.

And in Luke’s  third parable, the so-called Parable of the Prodigal Son, we’re actually given two kinds of deliberate lost-ness and no small amount of attitude (vs. 11-32). Two sons in this parable belong to the family. Each one chooses to deliberately step away. Decisively, dramatically, the youngest son tosses aside his father, his family and the community nurturing him (vs.12-14).  Jesus tells us after a while he “came to his senses” in a far away country and in a skilled use of storytelling we hear what Junior is thinking. He will return, admit he has sinned against the Lord and wronged his father (vs. 17-19). Meaningful words of confession and  repentance over a broken relationship. 

The father enters the scene “moved with compassion” (vs. 20). Long ago he made up his mind. He would forgive his son if he ever showed up on the outskirts of the village. Seeing his son on the horizon, without hesitation he gets up, runs, embraces and affectionately kisses him. Interrupting the son’s confession he commands servants to accessorize the son with robe, ring, sandals – emblems of restoration to sonship and fatherly care. And he commands them to set the table with a festival meal (vs. 21-24). His son was lost and has been found.

What about the other son?  Appearing first on the same horizon the older brother stops short of the house and speaks to a slave – not his father (vs. 25-27). He’s angry. Now children, unlike sheep and coins, have long memories and a voice of their own. He’s confident he’s right. He knows the rules, the questions and the answers. This son blurts out his rage, scolding his father with bitter words. His father’s not following the rules. He should have left the “little brat” on the horizon and not welcome him back (vs. 28-30).

In this last parable, the father delights in the younger son’s repentance but probably would prefer he not sink so low before coming to his senses. And the father would have liked to see the older son go into the house, warmly embrace his brother, kiss him, and weep on his neck. For both, it’s never too late to make the right decisions.

This parable’s theological point: forgiveness is always available to the one who turns. Sometimes we’re so full of ourselves, we’d rather destroy ourselves than endure being forgiven, than find the humility to accept we’re loved. Sometimes accepting forgiveness can be hard. Sometimes circumstances will lead us to understand how valuable commitment to family love is. Sometimes we’ll understand forgiveness only when we realize what we’ve done and want to change. On the other hand, we’re taught to forgive. Forgiveness becomes an act of courage because it lifts the lost over very, very high walls of rejection in order to reunite them with family and community. Personally this parable reminds me who lost sons on more than one occasion, how fortunate not to have lost them permanently. That’s worth celebrating. 

So here’s a Jesus point for us: In the final parable we are to feel the father’s heart wrenching compassion over two sons at odds with him and each other. And I can see that Luke’s edit uses this parable to show compassion belongs in all three parables. Since compassion belongs to the very nature of what it means to the Lord. A Lord determined to seek and save the lost. To be such a Lord is to feel his insides churn over lost-ness and to act on it. To be such a Lord is to search for, to heal, restore, renew, and in all ways to help. Compassion is important as it allows such a Lord to imagine himself in our shoes. Compassion is what arises when he is confronted with our lost-ness and it motivates him to die on the cross to relieve it. And to rise joyously on the third day and take a seat on a throne in triumphant celebration.

Here’s a Jesus’ hook in the three parables for everyone who’s been listening. When someone is lost, either by wandering, being misplaced or deliberately choosing that someone is missed, longed after, and not only worth the search party but worth ringing bells, swinging from the chandeliers in unrestrained joy before the Father, Son and Spirit as that someone is brought back into the sheepfold (vs. 6-7), the purse (vs. 9-10) or the family (vs. 22-24).

Some folk wander, some are misplaced and some even deliberately reject the Lord. Each of these parables, then, reveals something of the attitude, and the activity the Lord undertakes on behalf of the lost. Each one helps believers to see as the Lord sees and to develop some understanding and sympathy for some of the reasons why someone can be lost. And we should see, in these parables “insider” attitudes toward the wandering, the misplaced and the rebellious and attitudes of those who disparage them. Bottom line – Jesus is inviting everyone within hearing to extend their arms, turn up the palms of their hands adopting an attitude of divine compassion, patience and love.  

Luke’s final edit tells us there are lots of ways to be lost. And it also tells us there is Jesus who came to seek and save the lost. Jesus values us enough to search us out, to restore us to who we were created to be and to celebrate whenever we return. This morning, if you’re feeling lost, misplaced or have merely kicked everything to the side of the road then you’re in the right place. There are lots of wandering sheep, misplaced coins and fathers/mothers, sons/daughters here. Ask anyone. There’s probably one sitting next to you. May I suggest to you, they’re more than willing to help you find your way back into the sheepfold, the purse and the family. And more than willing to celebrate with you. We’re Anglicans for heaven’s sake!

May the Lord richly bless you, my Beloved.

John Michael Gutiérrez, PhD

The Holy Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ according to Luke

1 One Sabbath, when he went to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees, they were watching him carefully. 2 And behold, there was a man before him who had dropsy. 3 And Jesus responded to the scribes and Pharisees, saying, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?” 4 But they remained silent. Then he took him and healed him and sent him away. 5 And he said to them, “Which of you, having a son or an ox that has fallen into a well on a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?” 6 And they could not reply to these things. 7 Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he noticed how they chose the places of honor, saying to them, 8 “When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him, 9 and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. 10 But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. 11 For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” 12 He said also to the man who had invited him, “When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers[b] or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you will be repaid. 13 But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, 14 and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.”

Luke 14:1-14

The Gospel of the Lord.

The New Testament’s pantry is full of food and eating in social, religious and family settings. Routinely Jesus’ teaching references everyday food items, e.g. salt, seeds, bread, fish.  In some of his miracles, multitudes are fed with bread and fish. And, famously, there are his interpretive words about bread and wine at his last Passover meal. But meals aren’t always about the menu. In his dining with “tax collectors and sinners” Jesus came to be viewed skeptically.  Careful reading of the later Jesus movement, reveals how meals unite believers and promote a distinctive identity for this newly forming group, although, not without some controversy (Gal. 2.11-14, Ac. 10-11, 1 Cor. 11-14) 

This morning’s lectionary scene features a Pharisaic leader who invited Jesus to a Sabbath meal.  Theophilus already knows from Luke “Jesus…Pharisee…meal…Sabbath” is a type-scene for controversy.  The Sabbath meals in chapters 5 (vs. 29-32) and 7 (vs. 36-50) ended with Pharisees on the defensive. The Sabbath meal in chapter 11 ended with Pharisees “lying in wait for Jesus, to catch him in something he might say” (11:37-54).  So we shouldn’t be surprised when we read here: “the Pharisees were watching him closely” (vs. 1).  Right from the start of this scene, we suppose something provocative, at least from the Pharisaic point-of-view, is likely to occur. On the other hand, by the time Jesus gets to Jerusalem’s temple, he will be skilled at flipping tables (cf. 19.45-46).

This meal in addition to being a religious gathering is also a political-social event.  In the Second Temple period and the Roman world-at-large, a banqueteer would usually invite one’s social equals or superiors.  Accepting an invitation to a dinner carried with it expectations the invited would return the favor at some future time.  More about this in a few minutes. Obviously, poorer folk would never give/accept an invitation since they would not be able to pay/repay in kind. 

In Luke’s Gospel, then, Jesus’ frequently open-ended dinner is a kingdom strategy calling “correct” rules into question. This helps readers understand why Jesus is viewed as a threat.  This scene also has an unstated tension involving the unnamed but “prominent” Pharisee.  Pharisees tended to be only slightly better off than the destitute poor (Josephus, Ant 13.171-173). So beginning with the  appetizers, the “hosting” of this meal would have been somewhat tenuous. Since a garden variety Pharisee, although prominent, might not be able to pull it off financially.  

Time to pile on the tension. Into the scene comes a man with edema (vs. 2). The man is clearly out of place in this socially networked dinner.  Considering the theological pattern Luke has been constructing, it might not be far off the mark to suppose this apparently abrupt intrusion is a setup to back Jesus into a theological corner. After all it’s the Sabbath and the room is filled with folk for whom “meticulous auditing of Sabbath Oral Tradition” is of paramount importance.  Consistently in Luke, Jesus’ healing on Sabbaths demonstrates valuing Sinai Torah over Pharisaic Oral Tradition. Jesus under intense Pharisaic scrutiny is able to see who is in front of him – a man his scrutinizers are unwilling to see. Jesus questions them  “If one of you has a child or an ox that has fallen into a well, will you not immediately pull it out on a Sabbath day?” (vs. 5). His question exposes their field of vision has narrowed through the binoculars of Oral Tradition. They no longer see the Torah’s landscape – the greater needs of individuals on the Sabbath.  They’re silent. Without comment Jesus heals the man and sends him away, perhaps, back to his own family meal!

And now back to the banquet and who Jesus sees “in front of him…”.  Jesus has been noticing how the religious authorities are working the tables like wily, campaign shoutin’ politicians (vs. 7).  Here’s the background to Jesus’ parable in vss. 8-10. The place of honor reserved for the most important guests at banquets was around the head end or middle of tables . It would be public embarrassment for someone to take a prominent place assuming they were an important guest only to give it up to a more honored guest. That person’s “assumed” view of himself/herself would be on public display. So being reseated would be a source of shame. 

Jesus’ parable leads into a teaching moment.  Luke has seated Jesus as a sage among these sages at dinner. Wisdom in Israel has advice about how to act when someone is on the receiving end of an invitation to a banquet. In Hezekiah’s collection of Proverbs (Pro. 25:6, 7) there is cautionary advice to young princelings about how to behave, where to sit, stand,and eat in the king’s court. Even down to the Second Temple Period, Sirach still advises invitees to be deferential at such meals (Sir. 31:12-18).  So formed in Israel’s Wisdom teaching, Jesus’ truism on conventional table manners “For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted” (vs. 11) focuses on more than just “choosing” one’s seating. 

How are disciples to behave in the Kingdom? Certainly, proverbial advice can be misdirected, such as, play your cards right, and you can game the system’s social situations to your advantage. Neither is Jesus supporting conventional etiquette advice in a Dear Abigail column of his daily Judean Gazette. No, this is kingdom teaching: “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” (vs. 11). If you’re going to undo the thirst of status seeking then you can’t go to the best seat at the banquet. You have to go to the human heart. You have to go to the guest who is least likely to belong there in the first place. Jesus is pointing disciples in the direction of choosing to pursue humility.  This kingdom virtue marks disciples with honored status. His truism indicates humility turns the social world upside down. No doubt, humility is a tricky thing. It eludes us even when we try to define it in healthy ways. Very little in our culture recognizes, rewards or supports humility. Entertainment, politics, sports, and, regrettably, religion, have an unhealthy admiration for the loudest, the biggest, and the greatest.  Whether we recognize it or not, Christians too often idolize the superlatives “awesome” or  “cool”. Yet the discipleship thread Luke repeatedly turns to is: status in the kingdom is recognized not in social positions of power but in being a “servant” (cf. Luke 22:24-27).

Building on the truism’s reversal of social order, the scene’s narrative closure (vs. 12-14), narrows the focus from the banquet-at-large to the host – the one who holds the greater measure of control over the “rules of the table”.

In a second teaching moment, Jesus speaks directly to his host- the prominent pharisee. He will undermine one of the facets in the social system – patronage- that keeps the system on life support.  In the ancient world, society was strongly hierarchical. One’s place at dinner was guarded jealously. It seems for most it was a matter of survival to make sure they either stayed where they were. Position was a matter of individual achievement and community value. Self esteem was inseparable from what others thought about you. Most to be feared was to lose your seat publicly. Losing face was almost like losing one’s life.

Jesus challenges the Pharisee not to bolster his social status with friends, family or the famous. Instead, Jesus writes up a list of four guests “the poor and crippled, the lame, and blind” (vs. 13) and by implication the “uninvited” man with edema in the beginning scene (vs. 7). They’re of no social utility in the Second Temple banquet.  Jesus is encouraging his host to “dishonor” himself and his family. If he invites the poor and others, none of them can repay in kind. Through this guestlist, Jesus publicly disapproves of, at the very least, one Pharisee’s worldview.

We don’t know if the host responded to Jesus one way or another but this kind of censure and reversal of expectations and status is thematic in Luke. Turn back with me to a couple of sentences frequently read in evening prayer – Mary’s psalm “He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty.” (e.g., 1:52-53; also 6:20-26; 18:14). As disciples we are to hear a message unraveling society’s fabric of honor and status. Jesus has rewritten both the guest list and seating chart. In his teaching moments, Jesus subverts expectations disciples might have about social payment and repayment governing status in the kingdom community. His promise is that YHWH will repay Wisdom’s  hospitality at the “resurrection of the righteous” (vs. 14).  Because YHWH’s kingdom is not a kingdom of scarcity but of abundance:  all are already welcome, already loved, already cherished.  Because the status of that kingdom is humility not arrogance; compassion not indifference; service not self-promotion. For the time being disciples who eat and drink at YHWH’s table live in tension with pecking orders defining the society-around-them. That can be exhausting.  But it’s what disciples are called to do — to humble themselves placing hope in a radically different kingdom. YHWH is a host who will faithfully reward servant behavior.

Now the scribes and Pharisees weren’t the only ones listening. There’s the disciples, Theophilus and the readers.  Luke’s dinner scenes reveal some of the boundaries of human relationships. Tradition breaking discipleship, and/or  “lower-end-of-the-table” discipleship is deliberate not accidental, especially when things like status are being used as exclusion or power. Discipleship is about leveling the playing field not about defending turf. Where we choose to sit speaks volumes about relationships. And/or the people who we choose to invite reveal the character of discipleship. One of the messages of this lectionary reading is: disciples can become so distracted, so busy looking for a place at the table, and/or maintaining a place, they have missed the feast altogether. Keep this in mind: Jesus is skilled at flipping tables. So it seems to me the questions the Gospel lesson puts to disciples about commitments are: Do you really still think you hold the greater measure of control over the “rules of the table”. If so, then where have you seated Jesus at the table that is your life? For you see the actual discipleship issue is “If I’m going to sit at a table it needs to be where Jesus seats me because it’s a matter of the heart”. So the commitment question still remains “How can I best serve”?.

May the Lord richly bless you, my Beloved.

John Michael Gutiérrez, PhD

The Holy Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ according to Luke

49 ‘I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! 50 I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed! 51Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! 52 From now on, five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; 53 they will be divided: father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law  and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.’ 54 He also said to the crowds, ‘When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, “It is going to rain”; and so it happens. 55 And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, “There will be scorching heat”; and it happens. 56 You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time? 57 And why do you not judge for yourselves what is right? 58 Thus, when you go with your accuser before a magistrate, on the way make an effort to settle the case, or you may be dragged before the judge, and the judge hand you over to the officer, and the officer throw you in prison. 59 I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the very last penny.”

Luke 12:49-59

The Gospel of the Lord

In one sense, Jesus’ emphatic opening could be a proto-type for Cal Fire’s idea of controlled burning. For you see Jesus’ fire, furiously roiling through lives and comfort zones, is controlled, Spirit driven (cf. 4.18-19). Remember the Baptizer’s “I baptize you with water. But one who is more powerful than I will come, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire” (3.16). Now isolated from Luke’s narrative, no argument, a lot of folk read these as harsh words. But as close readers, let’s take the wider Lucan narrative into account. When we do, then these statements are not about Jesus dividing people but about a society’s smoke that gets in your eyes. So let’s begin with this. Since ch. 9.51, Jesus has been speaking sometimes to disciples, sometimes to religious leaders and sometimes to the “stepping all over each other” crowd (cf. 12.1).  Increasingly we realize some of the disciples and some in the crowd were listening. And some, such as the Pharisees, were listening suspiciously. But probably, the majority of the crowd was along for the ride: 1) because Jesus was becoming famous; 2) because he was feeding them and 3) because he was taking on the religious/political establishment. So I’m suggesting Luke’s aim in our lesson is this: Jesus starts to shrink the crowd by making discipleship more and more demanding.

In a big picture way, Jesus addresses everyone – their “across-the-board” inability to interpret “the present time” (v. 56), specifically, their national life. It’s a time of turmoil, division, and conflict. The Jewish people will soon pass painfully into a new age. They are not ready for the coming crisis. But they don’t get it. They can’t read the signs. But it’s not unique to Israel. Even to us Bob Dylan sings “you don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows”.

But here’s something they really don’t understand. Jesus says  ‘I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! (vs.49). And then he pours water on the fire:  “But I have a baptism to be baptized with” (vs. 50a). Again this is not Cal Fire hosing down a blaze. Fire/water are common images in Israel’s library concerning judgment not because they burn, flood and destroy but because they cleanse, purify, transform. For you see the Bible’s  theology of judgment is not primarily about punishment but about setting things right.  So the biblical point? In order to transform, sometimes something must be undone, either through burning or flooding. From that undoing, renewal emerges. Let me point you back to chapter 9.52-55. Remember James and John wanted to use pyro-theology on a Samaritan village. Luke tells us Jesus rebuked them. The point:  fire without transformation, that is, fire used merely for punishment, is rejected in kingdom ministry. Taking the wider view in Luke’s Gospel, this fire/this baptism in vs. 49-50 refers to Jesus’ death. Since 9:51 Jesus has fixed his sights on Jerusalem – a covert reference to his crucifixion. Out of this fiery baptismal cleansing will emerge the most miraculous of transformations — resurrection. But I’m getting ahead of Luke here.

And here’s one of the values of paying close attention to Luke’s simplest statements. Luke briefly lifts the lid on Jesus’ inner life “what stress I am under until it is completed!” (vs.50b). In our scene, Jesus acknowledges he is on the road to the cross. But he discloses he is having a difficult time holding himself together as the cross draws near The finish line is on the horizon. The cross is crucial. I suspect his mouth is dry, his arms are heavy and his heart is pounding. (you can read more about this in the Hebrews Epistle). Without Jesus’ faithfulness to death there would be no future for Israel, no renewal of the covenant, no outpouring of the Spirit, no redemption for the Gentiles, no transformation of creation.

In the shadow of the cross, the purifying fire and water reveal how completely and unreservedly transformation needs to be.  But not everyone grasps how urgent or how comprehensive. The topic of transformation now turns to statements exposing a disciple’s stress – the anxiety involved in personally committing to kingdom ministry, vs. 52ff. Allegiance will certainly generate divisions. Jesus goes right to the primary Jewish relationship: family. The commitment to family is prominently supported in Torah “Honor your father and your mother as YHWH your God has commanded you so that you may live long in the land YHWH your God is giving you” (Dt. 5:16). The family, along classic lines of inheritance and obligations, has been woven into this Gospel beginning in Galilee and especially during the journey to the cross. For starters, Jesus was rejected by his hometown and left his own family, even rejecting their later attempts to reel him in (4.28-30; 8.19-21). The 12, and we suppose the 70 plus many others, have also left their families and livelihoods.  Various unnamed folk at the border of the Galilee and Samaria have been challenged to cut inheritance, parental obligations to follow him (ch. 9.57-62). So Jesus’ statements here are not new.

But something fundamental is taking shape in Jesus’ teaching. Family is often given unquestioning allegiance around needs, status and wealth. But the family’s claims are restructured in Luke’s Gospel. Jesus challenges this formidable social-cultural structure because it can cloud one’s discipleship allegiance. In other words, that learning setting may subvert disciple teaching by Jesus. So Jesus encourages the potential disciple to “interpret the present time”, to step out of the family and place learning and allegiance into his family. 

Again the wider view from many statements already in Luke, we also know Jesus did come to bring peace (1:79, 2:14, 7:50, 8:48, 10:5). So let’s digress for a moment and consider in this narrative disciples are exposed to the dynamic of peace: peace is not peace unless it cleanses, transforms. Jesus didn’t shy away from talking about or getting involved in life’s mess.  But he is trying to burn/flood culture’s anger, frustration and anxiety out of a disciple’s life. And not merely to burn/flood but to purify in order to bring peace.

Jesus gathers the disciples with the crowd into a huddle. He softens the fire/water imagery to rain clouds and wind driven heat (vs. 54-55). But they’re still obvious signs of trouble. Then Jesus steps into his prophetic role confronting the close in crowd with the word “hypocrite” “actor”. I suggest this was intended to snap the entire crowd, especially disciples out of their thoughts.  

Here’s how I understand Jesus’ closing remarks in this scene specifically for disciples (vs. 56-59). The disciples have let ministry be sidetracked by the distractions of the “present time”, the spirit of the age. No doubt sometimes being faithful and following Jesus means you may just get caught in a storm. Sometimes disciples are to close the hatches, turning faces into the wind. Jesus never promised perfect weather. So this scene calls disciples to be realistic about the world. Bad things happen. Crises occur. People act violently and hurt others. The ruling powers can be unjust. Religious leaders can be corrupt. In times of stress, people can turn on each other, even family members. Realistically, Jesus does call disciples to embrace a faith and peace that can turn divisive. However, Biblical faith is transformational, changing ourselves and the community around us. So it seems to me, hypocrisy in this scene is subverting the Lord’s ethical and moral revelation with a culture’s spirit of the age. So you see Jesus pushes disciples and would be disciples in the crowd to read the signs of “this present time” intently. Again Bob Dylan sings “let us stop talking falsely now. The hour’s getting late”.

In a violent and suffering world, the ministry of the disciple is to practice kingdom behavior and peace now not later (4.18-19; 9.1-6; 10.1-20). Just like Jesus, the 12 and the 70 did. And here’s where we can further situate what seem to be abrupt statements in vs. 56-59. Jesus is underscoring the sense of ministry urgency. Disciples must live uncomplicated, straightforward lives that are not entangled in the spirit of the age.  Live lives free to devote oneself to the Lord. Acts of healing, compassion and reconciliation in a world of trouble and violence mend torn and tattered lives. Jesus definitely came into this world with a message calling disciples to get into relationships: real, messy, involved relationships.  And the sometimes unpleasant but ultimately beneficial reality is that that kind of ministry is disruptive. Why? Because it’s breaking what isn’t really working and creating new relationships ordered around Spirit transforming holiness.

Jesus is walking into a fiery baptism wanting to take others with him. We as disciples must reckon with the cost of this kind of discipleship. At a personal level, discipleship requires a clear-eyed walking into Jesus’ fiery waters of purification. As disciples we will make the world feel awkward when we live the way Jesus lived His life. It’s a different message than we’re used to hearing. But it is an important one. What needs to be broken in this world? What needs to be changed in this world? Defy political and cultural categories. Burn it, Flood it with the Spirit- transforming power of the crucifixion/resurrection/ascension! May I say this clearly: There’s fire and smoke on the water! certainly for me, maybe for some of you. May the Lord richly bless you my beloved.

John Michael Gutiérrez, PhD

The Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Luke 

 21 At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do. 22 “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and no one knows who the Father is except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” 23 Then turning to the disciples he said privately, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! 24 For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.” 25 And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 26 Jesus said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” 27 And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” 28 And Jesus said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.” 29 But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” 30 Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. 32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. 34 He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 And the next day he took out two denarii[a] and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ 36 Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” 37 He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”

Luke 10:21-37

The Gospel of the Lord

If you have been in/around liturgical communities for any length of time, then, the obvious lectionary induced difficulty is Jesus’s parables are familiar and beloved. Coming once again in the  three-year lectionary to the parable named “the Good Samaritan”, there is the strong temptation to assume that I “know” what is happening. 

In her study of Jesus’ parables, one of my favorite Jewish teachers Amy-Jill Levine suggests parables are meant “to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable.”  She writes, “if we hear a parable and think, ‘I really like that’ or, worse, fail to take any challenge, we are not listening well enough”. Miss Amy Jill’s observation “I don’t experience them as afflictions” fits me like a tailored suit. I know many of the parables inside out, upside down and backwards — and, therein the great danger for me – they no longer afflict me. I translate them. I read them. I nod, I assemble lectures. I write sermons. And I move on to the next narrative scene. Too often the parables I love most don’t lay me bare. May the Lord have mercy on me. When I can fight off the pressures of moving on and instead settle into the narrative just a little longer, previously unnoticed details come into view allowing the Bible time to “afflict” my formation.

This parable, in Luke’s wider “journey to the cross in Jerusalem” narrative, is positioned after the 70 “disciples” return from Galilean, Samaritan and Gentile towns/villages where they harvested for YHWH’s kingdom, pronounced Shalom on households housing them and healed the sick and the weak. Pulling them aside upon their return Jesus debriefs them on their kingdom ministry experience (vs. 21-22). “Then turning to the disciples he said privately, Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, but did not see it, and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it.” (vss. 23-24)

But a religious authority, a scribe, interrupts the debriefing asking a question clearly intended to investigate the authoritative basis of this ministry “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” (vs. 25). Luke tells us it’s a “test”. Our cultural “in the air” understanding of testing is usually a malicious aim to show up a weakness by setting a trap to catch a person in wrongdoing. But we need to understand “testing” in its biblical theology sense.  And that sense has the idea of exploring or validating the character, substance and authority of a person. In the Second Temple Period, any scribe worthy of his stylus would have been obligated to ask testing questions of Jesus.

Scribes were Temple academics trained in Written and Oral Torah, who knew about literature, definition of terms, tradition and various interpretations. And as those of you who participate in Daily Morning Prayer here at St. Stephen’s know first hand, the presence of an academic indicates complications are about to arise. Here’s an amplified version of the scribe’s question: How can I participate in the world to come after the resurrection of Israel? What kinds of choices does one have to make to be a part of the world to come when the Land is renewed? Now the dominant Temple personnel, the Sadducees and we suppose also, the scribes, didn’t subscribe to the resurrection. What is to be understood by “eternal life” is rather vague even in later rabbinic literature. So attempts to systematize or organize it during the Sadducean Period imposes upon it an order and consistency that does not exist. In other words, questions about the “world to come” or “eternal life” were still open for scholarly discussion. This scribe, then, is asking for Jesus’ position on an unsettled topic he considers central to Jesus’ ministry instructions to the 70.

Jesus, putting on his best Jewish rabbi, asks two questions to the one question asked of him. They begin sparing with each other, working out what a nuanced conversation might disclose. And we will hear, as we would say, they are on the same page. 

“What is written…What do you read? These questions are Jesus’ test of the scribe to determine if he has given careful thought first to the way the Torah is written and then how it is interpreted. The scribe responds with Israel’s Shema:  “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” (cf. Dt. 6.5). But notice carefully, he omits the covenantal declaration “ Hear, O’ Israel, YHWH is our God. YHWH is one” and then inflates the Shema first with “and with all your mind” and  second from Leviticus’s holiness code “and your neighbor as yourself” (Lev. 19.18).

As usual when Torah is quoted, there is more text we need to hear. The Shema is said reasonably unchanged. But the scribe’s Leviticus quote is scaled way down from a more complete statement embedded in ch. 19. For example, vs. 18 reads “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am YHWH”. And a few sentences down the scroll in vs. 33-34 “When a foreigner resides with you in your land, you shall not wrong him. The foreigner who resides with you shall be to you as the native among you; you shall love him as yourself, for you were foreigners in the land of Egypt: I am YHWH your God”. In these sentences the  “foreigner” acquires neighbor density. The foreigner is declared to be the equivalent of one of the “sons of your own people”, therefore a “neighbor”.

Long story short “Love YHWH, love your neighbor,” says the scribe.  Remember, he was wondering about how to “inherit eternal life”. His Torah answer, while good, didn’t specifically address it.  And Jesus’ response? Well he could hardly have put it better himself.  “You have answered rightly”. Now take the next step. “Do this and you will live” (vs. 28). Jesus is focused on a covenantal obedient way of living in the present age well shy of the world to come.

Those who understand how rabbis converse are in no doubt Jesus’ pronouncement conveys a sense of authority. Luke observes the scribe wanted to “justify” himself. He asks another question “And who is my neighbor?” (vs.29).  Trigger Word. Red flag. über -Reformation minded folk consider it a severe theological error to think that anyone can justify himself.  I’m going to go out on a limb here and consider the possibility that neither this scribe nor Luke have read Luther, Calvin,Grudem or Piper.  So perhaps we can read Luke as meaning he wanted to be clear or have a better understanding. He wants more than Sabbath school theology. We might suspect he expected a definition of “neighbor”. This would have been important for any scribe.

I’m suggesting the scribe does not ask “Who is my neighbor?” out of ignorance. He knows the root idea is “one that comes near”. And based on his Levitical addition to the Shema, he knows his neighbor is both Israelite and foreigner. What he wants is to explore with Jesus how he can practically live and be right with YHWH.

Jesus launches their exploration in the form of a parable broadening the scribe’s interpretation of his Torah quote. If he thinks in terms of obligation he places himself as a person who has neighbors to whom he is obliged. Axiomatic to the covenant’s instruction about love and faithfulness, he doesn’t have neighbors rather he is a neighbor. It’s a covenantal way of being, not a way of obligation. So how he treats his “neighbors” and how he treats the LORD are inescapably linked. 

One of Jesus’ most famous parables begins with an act of brutal violence. An unidentified person going down the 17 mile road from Jerusalem to Jericho is beaten, stripped of everything and left half-dead by bandits.

Jesus then introduces two characters familiar to the scribe from the Deuteronomic formula “priest and Levite”(cf. chs. 18-27).  Both a priest and Levite are going down to Jericho from Jerusalem. Maybe they’ve completed a temple rotation.  Both see the wounded person and pass by, in the end doing nothing to help. In the Second temple period, a priest and Levite, in addition to being temple functionaries,  were public health officials. They were tasked with observation and discernment, that is, with coming into contact with and attending to the health and wellbeing of the sick and injured. This parable turns, then, on the observation the priest and Levite could have done what the Samaritan is about to do.

The third character to come down the road is a Samaritan. Now Jesus has the scribe’s full attention. A Samaritan is not, from the perspective of a Jewish academic, totally outside Israel, a complete foreigner. Samaritans are the “break-away’s”, the Leavers”. So Samaritans occupy a much more infuriating place: they are ones who are near; they are like Jews. Jews and Samaritans were in a prejudicial theological-social tug-o-war with each other. This Samaritan, after all, had a priesthood and temple on Mount Gerizim and was bound by the Torah telling him his “neighbor” is not only his kin and countryman but also the foreigner. 

At this point, the scribe may be thinking Samaritans live on the other side of the border. This one, who should keep out of this country, is traveling in Judea. It is not likely the half-dead person is concerned with the fine points about who is or is not a neighbor. 

So like the priest and Levite, the Samaritan is coming down the road and sees the beaten bloody person.  Whereas they “passed by on the other side,” the Samaritan jerks the reins of his animal to a stop. What he sees is “visceral, gut wrenching”. He refuses to pass by on the other side. His actions, described in detail, are oriented toward the man’s long-term wellbeing. He comes near to the man, touching him, binding and pouring oil and wine over the wounds – the sacrificial libations of the altar and the standard first aid remedies used by priests and Levites. He lifts him onto his animal and walks him to a Jericho inn. Extending this act of hospitality, he places himself at personal financial risk.

Jesus questions the scribe:  “Which of these three, do you think, came to be neighbor of the man?”  The scribe can’t bring himself to say out loud “Samaritan” so he answers with the indefinite:  “The one doing mercy to him.” Or in Second Temple speak, “the one practicing covenant fidelity”. And a second time Jesus tells the temple scholar to go and do the same (vs. 37).  

Since ch.9.51 where Jesus set his sights on the journey to the cross, Luke has at least two important themes to develop: the theology of the cross and the practice of discipleship.

In today’s and the previous two Sunday’s Gospel readings, the resolve of Jesus to train disciples as he heads toward Jerusalem is picking up momentum. Although this scene isolates Jesus and a scribe, we need to remember the 12, the 70 and many others are standing around listening in.

The discipleship intention of this parable is to continue forming them and us into a community. The parable points at them and us the need to need one another. Disciples can’t do a “neighborly” ministry on their own. Only together can kingdom change be effective.

Embedded in Jesus’ question: “What is written? How do you read?” is a discipleship review of a crucial operating principle. Jesus’ instructions to the 70 for their ministry contained implied tensions for Torah observance. They were going to encounter Samaritans, Gentiles not Jewish folk only. The 35 pairs have just returned from ministry where they encountered issues about being hospitable, being neighborly, being Torah observance, bringing blessing, healing and wellbeing for the sick and weak in practical ways (ch. 10.5-10).

Perhaps like the Scribe, the first –century Jewish folk listening in knew Torah well enough to have the right answers come to mind under questioning. Perhaps they also knew Torah well enough to make it work for them. 

Through the instruction to the 70 and through the parable Jesus is asking disciples to form a practice of Torah around the purposes it intends. He’s directing disciples to consider a person adds up to more than the sum of political, religious, racial, cultural, or economic identities.  He’s asking disciples to put aside the prejudices they’ve nursed.  He’s asking them to leave wiggle room in religious observance to make room for kingdom-altering surprises (10. 21-23).

A disciple’s life is formed in community relationships. In the biblical world-view my only access to meaningful discipleship is through my learning to love someone else. If the Samaritan can become a neighbor and Jesus implies the scribe can become a neighbor like the Samaritan then I can be a neighbor. As Jesus says “Go and do the same”

Lastly, Luke’s wider intent is to present a portrait of Jesus framed in the theological dimensions of the cross.  I suggest, then, Luke intends disciples to place themselves into the characterization of the wounded man so that Jesus becomes the Samaritan neighbor. This parable becomes a factor helping disciples to grasp deeply the gut wrenching decision of Jesus. He is determined to go up to Jerusalem to be wounded and die on a cross. 

Billy Graham’s father-in-law, L. Nelson Bell was a medical missionary to China. One of his Chinese colleagues told him this story: a man was walking along a path when he stumbled. He  fell into a deep mud filled ditch. The more he struggled to climb out, the more he sank into the pit’s grasp.  Eventually he heard some footsteps, looking up he saw Confucius and raised his arms for help. Confucius said: “if you had listened to me, you would not have fallen in the ditch”. And walked away. The man renewed his attempt to get out but soon became exhausted. Then he heard other footsteps, looking up he saw Buddha who said: “if you come up here I will show you how to walk”.  The man sank in hopeless despair. He heard the sound of other approaching steps. This time he looked up and saw Jesus but before he could lift a hand or say a word Jesus leaped into the ditch and lifted him out.  

Finally, allow me to reflect theologically on discipleship. I have been beaten, bruised and left half dead on the road by that bandit – Sin. When I, perhaps you, am trapped in a ditch, what matters is whether anyone will stop to show me mercy before I die. It is Jesus who is viscerally gut wrenched at the sight of my violent wounds.  It is Jesus who refuses to pass by on the other side. It is Jesus who is determined to bring me help and healing by paying the price for my well being.  Luke is most certainly telling me, perhaps you, in this Gospel Jesus has stretched out wounded hands on the cross to care for my/your wounds and the wounds of others. In the care of his/my/your and our wounded hands there is wellbeing and healing. Because  remember the 70’s discipleship instruction  “When you enter a house, first say, ‘Peace to this house.’ …. Heal the sick who are there and tell them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you (10.5-9). Because remember Jesus says two times in this parable “Go and do the same”. Amen.

John Michael Gutiérrrez, PhD
The Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Luke

After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. 2 He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. 3 Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. 4 Do not take a purse or bag or sandals; and do not greet anyone on the road. 5 “When you enter a house, first say, ‘Peace to this house.’ 6 If someone who promotes peace is there, your peace will rest on them;
if not, it will return to you. 7 Stay there, eating and drinking whatever they give you, for the worker deserves his wages. Do not move around from house to
house. 8 “When you enter a town and are welcomed, eat what is offered to you. 9 Heal the sick who are there and tell them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near
to you.’ 10 But when you enter a town and are not welcomed, go into its streets and say, 11 ‘Even the dust of your town we wipe from our feet as a warning to
you. Yet be sure of this: The kingdom of God has come near.’ 12 I tell you, it will be more bearable on that day for Sodom than for that town. 13 “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago,
sitting in sackcloth and ashes. 14 But it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for you. 15 And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted to the
heavens? No, you will go down to Hades. 16 “Whoever listens to you listens to me; whoever rejects you rejects me; but whoever rejects me rejects him who sent me.” 17 The seventy-two returned with joy and said, “Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name.” 18 He replied, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. 19 I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to
overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you. 20 However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in
heaven.”

Luke 10:1-20

The Gospel of the Lord

Lectionaries, plans for reading Scripture, have been a consistent element in
Christian worship for many centuries.  In ancient times, they took the form of
excerpts from the Epistles and Gospels. In modern times, lectionary plans have
been expanded to include readings from the Hebrew Bible and the Psalms. The
point of expanded lectionary readings is, of course, to let Scripture speak for
itself, and to promote familiarity with its teachings in a broadly coherent way. 
One of the defining activities of the Anglican tradition, perhaps its prized activity,
is the way it reads Scripture when a community is assembled together for
morning/evening prayer and/or the Lord’s Supper.  Which is to say, without a lectionary, the corporate and ecclesial identity of Anglicanism would be much
diminished.

In spite of historical and ecclesial strengths, American lectionary renewal, at least
since 1928, has increasingly omitted sections /sentences from scripture readings.
Ironically, their removal seems only to draw more attention to them. In the past,
this morning’s Gospel reading has felt the liturgist’s surgical steel removing vss.
12-15. Although never said outright, the reason seemed to be the omitted
passages might not go down well with American sensibilities about “all you need
is love, love is all you need”.

Speaking as a biblical academic, there are serious problems with removing
sections of biblical texts. So I am relieved they have been returned to the
lectionary in our prayer book. In the middle of Luke 10, Jesus begins to sound
some definite notes about those who reject the Kingdom message. As far as all
the Gospels are concerned, Jesus’ threats weren’t hiccups in his teachings. He
isn’t always the inclusive Jesus former lectionary compilers tried to create by
cutting out the “other” stuff. The purpose of lectionary readings is to proclaim the
mystery of the Gospel in a theologically coherent way. Removing sections
diminishes, even abandons coherence altogether. Reading/hearing Scripture in
its final forms, lets every faith community grapple with difficulties posed by such
texts.

Luke’s introductory, “After these things” (vs.1a) ties the start of the 70’s ministry
to the immediately preceding interactions with the 3 would-be disciples (9:57-62)
And it repeats on a “grander scale” the ministry of the 12 from ch. 9 (vs. 1-6).
Now those with an “ear” for Moses will hear in the 70 and the 12, Luke’s literary,
thematic and theological cross-referencing. For you see, in Luke’s worldview
Jesus is in one way like Moses. He’s resetting Israel. So his 12 were like the 12
Patriarchal clans and his 70 like the 70 clan leaders of the Exodus/Wilderness
stories (Ex. 24.1, 9-14; Num. 7; 11.16-30). But remember Luke clearly presents
Jesus as LORD, someone far greater than Moses.

Luke’s second introductory phrase “sent them before his face” (vs. 1b) builds on
the Gospel’s vision of discipleship. Remember again Jesus has just “set his face
toward Jerusalem” (9.51). Everything in the journey to Jerusalem is intentional.
The 70 are examples of those who participate in the journey to Jerusalem, even
if they didn’t grasp the details.

The rationale for 70 and their ministry: “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers
are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his
harvest field.’” (vs. 2).  Here is a glimpse into Luke’s brilliance. The “LORD of the
harvest” is a two sided coin. Theologically it clearly refers to Israel’s lord YHWH
who harvests (vs. 2b). But note carefully in numerous contexts and when the 70
return, Luke refers to Jesus as “LORD” (7:13, 19; 10: 20, 39, 41). So Theophilus, other readers/hearers like us could be forgiven for concluding this Jesus who
sends out the 70 is also Israel’s “LORD who harvests”.

Jesus’ flurry of instructions – the setting aside of standard travel gear- sounds a
cautionary note. The 70 are to take no supplies: wallet, suitcase or extra sandals.
And then in a time saving measure underscoring the urgency, they are to “greet
no one along the way”. They will not be going exclusively to the “lost sheep of
Israel” like the 12 (for example,Matt. 10:5-6). In this ministry, they will be “like
lambs surrounded by wolves” (vs. 3). Geographically Luke has placed Jesus and
the disciples at the borderlands of the Galilee next to Samaria. So the 70 are
being sent into villages having Jewish/Samaritan populations. And also sizable
non-Jewish populations. Pay attention how the 70’s ministry is set out in a string
of indefinites: “Whatever house you enter… if anyone there…remain in the
same house, eating and drinking whatever they provide…whenever you enter a
town and its people welcome you, eat whatever is set before you…”
On the one hand, all in all these instructions might seem to heighten uncertainty.
And please note uncertainty and caution are not fear. Yes, they will be engaging
society in an unconventional way. Yet even with supposed disadvantages, they
will be armed with a prophetic message: “The kingdom has come near” and a
priestly blessing: “Shalom” – well-being for those who open their households.
They are to aid those who are weak as a basic practice of Kingdom ministry.
Jesus, who ate with “tax collectors and sinners”, tells the 70 they will need to be
more relaxed regarding dietary regulation. They are to eat what is given to them.
It seems to me in Second Temple Literature, dietary observances were hit-n-miss
among ordinary Jewish folk. Samaritans, regulated by Torah, were hit-n-miss
also. Is it too obvious to say anything about any dietary restrictions in Gentile
households?

So the 70 are about to disappear two-by-two over the dusty horizon as kingdom
harvesters. They will proclaim the prophet’s Kingdom and priest’s Shalom to
those who offer them hospitality as well to those who do not. They are still well
shy of Jerusalem. Yet the disciples will experience something of the rejection
Jesus will soon experience. They will come to know not everyone will appreciate,
to say the least, hearing the Kingdom is near. And think back, the 70 have the
same dramatic gesture in their back pocket as the 12 did (cf. 9.5). “Shake dust
from their feet”. A response to those who reject them. For if they had been proper
hosts, who washed the feet of their guests, there would be no dust to shake! 
The 70’s imminent departure is of enormous significance and emotion. The
prophetic-like woes on the Jewish villages/towns in verses 12-15, just might be
the point of this scene. These are Jesus’ final words to the 70 about the burden
of their responsibility. They are to do all they can to ensure the positive reception
of kingdom and blessing. Using Jewish villages/towns as reference points Jesus
emphases Israel’s opportunities. And, therefore, its greater accountability. Don’t
look to the Jewish Bethsaida, Capernaum or Chorazim, where he did great things, and think they’re a cut above. Position, privilege, influence and pride are
not the right starting places. Rather it’s humility, reception and hospitality. In
reality, these towns could be worse off than even the legendary inhospitable
Sodom. Because these Jewish towns’ pride of being on the A-Team can blind
them to the hospitable reception of Tyre and Sidon who “had come to hear Jesus
to be healed of their diseases. For in them those who were troubled with unclean
spirits were cured.” (6:17). Lastly, Jesus makes it clear that any rejection of the
70 is actually rejection of him, and, in turn, a rejection of the LORD who harvests
(vs. 16). Here’s the intention: In the fading echo of the woes, then, Jesus wants
the departing 70 to feel the heavy weight of Israel’s classical prophets: rejection
of the kingdom and its shalom is an opening to the tragedy of divine judgment.
The 70 come back to Jesus addressing him as “LORD”. They were wildly
successful, or so they think, since “in your name even the demons submit to us!”
(vs.17).  They appear to have been completely caught off guard. Jesus, also,
seems overjoyed by this development “I was seeing Satan fall like lightning out of
heaven” (vs. 18). It’s an indication one core feature of Jesus’ messianic mission
is a spiritual-cosmological tug-o-war. Satan is more than an idea, a “myth,” or
medieval superstition. Satan and demons were/are a real force committed to
damaging and destroying Jews, Samaritans and Gentiles. Through Jesus, the
kingdom is advancing with the intention of disarming all demonic forces. Jesus
reminds them discipleship and ministry is about the name and authority of the
One the 70 represent rather than what they are able to accomplish.

Several things occur to me about the 70 and their discipleship. The 70 would
seem to have accepted the three disciple-ing challenges in the previous scene
(9.57-62). No longer in families or crowds, they have been singled out, sent out
to proclaim the kingdom, to bless with Shalom, to eat with all kinds of folk, to care
for those who have lost their strength. In stepping out they were transformed
from bystanders to active participants.

In Jesus’ unfolding journey, Luke urges Theophilus and us to walk with Jesus
and with the 12/70. His narrative intention is to speak to every generation of
would-be disciples. Like the 12/70 we’re not to withdraw from society but we’re to
walk in it very differently. Like the 12/70, my discipleship can send/has sent me
into unknown territory. Like the 12/70 I can, if I’m not careful, use my theology to
keep doors closed and tables unoccupied, absolutely sure of my privilege and
certain in my judgments. And it is ever so easy for me to stay in the anonymous
crowd safe from real engagement with the issues Jesus calls me to face.
However, in the footsteps of the 12/70, not actually knowing where I’m going, I
can become a low-maintenance member of any household welcoming me,
bringing wellbeing, learning to listen to and aiding those who are weak.
By sending the 12/70 out in pairs, Jesus made sure they learned discipleship and
ministry involves community. By sending them out in pairs, Jesus taught them
they were not alone. Jesus was telling them “You’re going to need each other”.

I’m sure they didn’t always get along. Sometimes teams have a tough time
working together. Sometimes they get stones in their sandals. It seems to me
there was more than one disagreement among the 35 pairs about table manners.
Still, they learned they needed each other. Here’s Luke’s point: discipling is not
an individual endeavor. I need you, we need each other. It seems to me,
kingdom ministry is served by seeing how we can “pair” ourselves with each
other. It also seems to me, in light of their joyful experience, there are few things
more satisfying and life-giving than sharing with others, giving and receiving in
humility, and all the while being united more closely together as a community.
Lastly, Jesus warned the 70 to expect resistance, rejection, danger. Like Luke’s
audiences, we know the reference to lambs and wolves described danger (vs. 3).
The similarities between the Greco-Roman setting and ours are striking. Then as
now, proclamation of kingdom and blessing is for neither “the faint-hearted nor
the impatient” disciple. Now here comes a couple of long sentences. The
intensifying assault on biblical faith/practice in America is prosecuted by a
secularism promoting ethical-moral autonomy, actually insurrection. A
considerable swath of the polarized, political Right and Left, academic, legal,
media and entertainment industries, supported by corporate America, produces,
justifies, spearheads and finances assaulting Biblical truth, attitudes, behaviors,
thoughts and speech. The driving narrative is policed as an extension of “my
lived experience” and “justice”. A Christian’s refusal to affirm the cultural
ideology, what Orwell called “goodthink doublespeak”, is identified as phobia,
bigotry or hate. Like the early Christians, identified disciples will soon find it
difficult to live peaceably within this progressive society, unless, of course, you
shut up.

Know this: the substance of our supposed “intolerance”, like that of the early
Christians, was allegiance to the Lord Jesus, choosing to think and behave with
mercy, holiness, Spirit guided virtues, forgiveness, reconciliation and moral
boundaries. In the troubled waters of America, Christians are increasingly seen
as threats to social stability because we won’t harvest for their lords. So the
Jesus ministry will require more and more alertness, looking intently for anyone
opening a household door. And it seems to me, like the 12/70, believing
communities must begin to find ways to be actively hospitable and grace-filled in
this country. Like the early Christians, being identified as Jesus’ disciple will yield
a far greater harvest because it will come at a far greater cost. Disciples and
would-be disciples would do well to walk the Jesus journey with eyes wide open
looking for, on the one hand, opening doors and on the other expecting rejection.
And I’ll close with this exhortation from the Ep. of Jude: “Be merciful to those who
doubt; save others by snatching them from the fire; to others show mercy, mixed
with caution—hating even clothing stained by corrupted flesh (vs. 22-23). In other
words, returning again to vs. 12-15, there is no place in the prophetic harvest of
the kingdom and its shalom for a disciple to be indifferent to the tragedy of divine
judgment about to come down on this world and the world to come. One heart,
one mind, one household at a time. Amen.

John Michael Gutiérrez, PhD

The Holy Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ according to Luke

51 As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. 52 And he sent messengers ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; 53 but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem. 54 When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?” 55 But Jesus turned and rebuked them. 56 Then he and his disciples went to another village. 57 As they were walking along the road, a man said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” 58 Jesus replied, “Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.” 59 He said to another man, “Follow me.” But he replied, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” 60 Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” 61 Still another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but first let me go back and say goodbye to my family.”62 Jesus replied, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.”

Luke 9:51-62

The Gospel of the Lord

Close readers of Luke’s Gospel, and I’m including Theophilus and us, have long recognized the strategic importance of this morning’s first sentence “… as the days were being fulfilled for his ascension, he set his face on Jerusalem”.  It’s a “game changer” to use our language. Everything from this point will be focused on Luke’s recognizable “Journey to Jerusalem” serialized story. Once there, Jesus will fulfill his messianic mission by crucifixion, resurrection and ascension. 

Geographically Jesus leaves the Galilee and for the next ten chapters heads south to Jerusalem.  Theologically two themes will dominate the long, deliberate journey. Unquestionably one issue explores what the messiah’s approaching suffering and death looks like in kingdom theology. And for would be and close followers, the travel narrative focuses on discipleship and community in kingdom theology. So in year C, Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem is placed near the beginning of our Trinity lessons to focus us on our discipleship journey. 

Previously Jesus twice cautioned the disciples regarding his impending suffering (9:21-27, 44-45). And the disciples confessed their faith in him as Messiah (9:18-20). And three of them saw him transfigured with Moses and Elijah (9:28-36). Still, they cannot, as yet, begin to imagine the horror of Jesus’ last days. But Jesus knows. And still he “sets his face” toward Jerusalem (vs. 51). The idiom “sets his face” is understood here as “fixed purpose” or “resolute determination” expressing an unwavering trust in the LORD.  And Lord knows, he will need it!

One of Luke’s focusing features is the frequent weaving of Old Testament characters and themes into the journey.  The insertion of the phrase, “… as the days were being fulfilled” turns the reader back to the prior scene, the Transfiguration and to Israel’s prophetic tradition. Remember, Moses and Elijah, prophetic models, discussed with Jesus his redemptive Exodus. I’m suggesting Luke positioned the Transfiguration as the opening set piece for the “redemption journey”. And keep this in mind, Luke will have a prophetic bookend when Jesus explains to two disciples on the Emmaus path what ‘Moses and all the prophets’ said about him (Luke 24.27). 

The new/old redemptive Exodus of Jesus will become, as the narrative unfolds, a paradigm for Jesus’ followers. Luke repeatedly sets up ‘training sessions’ and ‘immersion experiences’ in mission. The Gospel’s study guide for  “would-be” disciples involves some instruction in prophetic preaching (6.17-35) and parables (15.1-32), – some fieldwork about prayer, healings and exorcisms (9.1-6), – some “table talk” in their eating, drinking with each other (22.14-38). 

Please note today’s lectionary has arranged four immersion experiences. There will be a brief narrative scene as Jesus passes by a Samaritan village. This is followed by Jesus’ three responses highlighting the challenges to discipleship. A would-be disciple voices a willingness to join in with Jesus (vs. 57). To which Jesus points out the inconvenience of being a disciple. Discipleship is a journey involving being unsettled as well as experiencing rejection. A second would-be disciple takes a different approach (vs. 59). He lists the important commitments he has limiting his ability to follow. And to a third would be disciple (vs. 61), Jesus makes use of Israel’s wisdom tradition. Proverbially, if you are plowing a field, you need to focus ahead in order to plow straight. If you look around or to one side, you will fail to steer the plow in a straight line. The proverbial connection sends Theophilus and the reader back to vs. 51 where Jesus “sets his face” plowing straight toward Jerusalem and the LORD’s purposes.

So let’s look more closely at the beginnings of this “journey to Jerusalem”. Beginning outside a Samaritan village, advance “messengers” — one might call them the “Hospitality Committee” — went “before his face” into a village to do their job (vs. 52).  Luke implies the ‘hospitality committee” made the arrangements, put out the welcome mat but never got the opportunity to welcome Jesus.  Luke tells us for a second time, vs. 53, Jesus had “set his face toward Jerusalem” passing by the Samaritan village. He decided to stick with his decison. 

Now it’s surprising to me how many folk routinely point out it’s the Samaritans turning Jesus away. Close reading of this narrative suggests something different. Luke’s focus is not on what the Samaritans did or did not do. But on what Jesus decided to do – stick with his determination. Now notice Luke shifts the scene’s tension to two disciples. It seems they “read” Jesus’ staying with his original plan as Samaritan rejection. Mistaken, they want to pin the issue to the Samaritans. “Samaritans”.  For heaven’s sake, they’re  historic “break-aways”, with a competing Temple, Torah and monarchy. So into this scene, simmering with imagined inhospitality, James and John fresh off their transfiguration experience with Elijah, mix in some of Sodom’s legendary inhospitality. Voila! Both Elijah and Sodom had pyrotechnic solutions (Gen. 19; 1 Kgs. 18; 2 Kgs. 1). So  “ Hey, Lord, do you want us to give them the “fire-from-heaven” treatment and bump ‘em off”? (vs. 54).  “Pyro-theology” and they’re the ones to administer it!  Luke says simply Jesus rebuked them.  

As I’m pointing out, a close reading of the Lukan “journey narrative” focuses us on discipleship training. So may I suggest Luke has a purpose for Elijah in the transfiguration different than shock and awe. It seems to me Luke’s theological focus is discipleship mission. Having trained his disciple Elisha, Elijah is taken away and his mission is passed to Elisha (2 Kings (2: 9-15). And remember both Moses and Elijah transferred their leadership at the end of their ministry and a greater than Moses or Elijah is here. So in like manner at the end of his exodus journey Jesus’ mission will be passed on to his disciples (24.45-49). 

Reading Luke’s discipleship training theme this way highlights Jesus’ rejection of the violence expressed by his disciples. Jesus’ crucifixion mission will not involve a misdirected action. Further his rebuke of the disciples’ knee jerk bias against Samaritans-at-large will come into sharper focus soon enough when He tells the parable of a Samaritan “neighbor” (10:25-37). To read this text in the manner in which I am suggesting, is to more properly feel Jesus’ censure of his disciples for having resorted to a visceral act. Luke’s instructive point regarding discipleship, it seems to me, is this: Violence is the loss of a moral capacity to love one’s imagined enemies. So the overreach for violence is an insidious impulse to a dangerous power. In the end, violence is alien to the kingdom’s capacity for justice in judgment. And Jesus will have nothing to do with violence.

After Jesus and the disciples passed by one Samaritan village, setting off toward another on their way to Jerusalem, three persons approached Jesus wanting to be among his disciples.  And you would expect Jesus might say, “Come on then”.  But consistently Jesus does not encourage just anyone to become his disciple. Actually He seems to discourage them. He points out to them the radical call he is making.  And the study guide point: disciple-ing takes a greater commitment than some may be willing to give. 

In Luke’s discipleship theme, these episodes at the start of his journey to Jerusalem become striking illustrations of the cost of discipleship – anywhere, any time.  Jesus’ response to the first two cut right across normal social expectations of the Second Temple Period, while the third response underlined the calvary road, once chosen whether by Jesus or by any of his followers, should not be sidetracked.  He chides those who have excuses for not immediately following him. Here is yet another connection to the Elijah-Elisha story where Elisha was allowed to return home to settle his affairs. Jesus is so much more than Elijah – so more is required. Luke highlights the person’s desire to observe burial customs (vs. 59). Note the irony the journey to Jerusalem entails – death, dying to self with every step. Nevertheless, the journey must be made by Jesus and by his disciples because this is the only journey that leads to life. There will be no escape clause for Jesus in this unfolding story. And there might not be one for those who follow him.

 Broadly, Jesus is saying a disciple can’t fence off parts of their lives from the total claims he makes.  People have houses, says Jesus, even animals have burrows and nests, but a kingdom-seeking person must be ready to have “weaned affections”.  A home is a blessing, indeed, but a kingdom-seeking person needs to recognize it is a blessing and not a right. In first-century Palestine, it was customary for the eldest son to stay home, manage the property of his aging parents, and finally see to their proper burial. If that is the situation here, Jesus’ reply is not a command to skip a parent’s funeral. Rather it is a challenge to leave home now—not some thirty years hence—to join in the Kingdom’s mission. To look back from the plow, whether to family living or dead, was to risk cutting a crooked furrow and thus ruining the work altogether. There is no place for looking back or sideways.  Rather, a would-be disciple must be single-minded in purpose, setting their face like Jesus on the task at hand.

No one is forced to make this journey with Jesus. Lukan discipleship is a choice to be seized. Jesus’ responses can be interpreted as recognition that important things are happening every day in my life. So opportunities must be acted upon while they are still available. Today’s opportunities will never return. There is wisdom in identifying those things impeding the mission, understanding sometimes I have to walk on to the next village. 

When Jesus set his face to Jerusalem, he turned his back on Nazareth, on the Galilee, on his life as a contractor, small town teacher and preacher. When Jesus set his face for Jerusalem, he knew he was going to his death, he knew he was, from that very moment, walking to the cross. In the urgency of the story, I as a reader and a “would be” disciple am invited to discover the urgency of what discipleship entails. I am to learn from this beginning, Jesus encounters obstacles both from his closest followers and from those who want to postpone commitment to a more convenient time. In these interactions Jesus is calling me, a would-be disciple and us, a believing community into question and that’s never easy, fun, or comfortable. Many folk are ardent for their families, hobbies, talents, professions, favorite sport teams. They need reminders about priorities. All of us do. Jesus is calling into question the direction of my life, the values I claim to hold, and how I am living and embodying those values.  All earthly anxieties must be evaluated as part of the total call to discipleship. Discipleship can involve rejection, personal sacrifices, foxes and birds, family alienation, a funeral but most certainly always involve single-mindedness. Often opposition and conflict enable me/us to clarify goals, strengthen convictions, and increase courage in kingdom ministry. This lectionary lesson is most obvious when I/we see the obligation to follow Jesus as first priority. Only then will I/we be able to follow his resolve to our Jerusalem. Once there, only then will we recognize how what we learned along the way prepared us for the challenge of the cross. 
So Jesus’ would-be disciples need to look ahead rather than sideways or backward. Discipleship in community is a challenge, an adventure to healing and wholeness, forgiveness. Setting out on this redemptive journey, the destination might well be unexpected and surprising. We will need to let go of familiar patterns, social requirements, and relational certainties and most certainly, violence.  Jesus’ intent is for us to see family and obligations in a new light – to love, but love without possessing, to own but without greed, to save but to give generously, and to care for loved ones but willing to break out of patterns standing in the way of kingdom ministry. Jesus’s kingdom is not some inclusive community, where all belong in order to make them feel self affirmed. Rather his kingdom community involves a redemptive exodus journey of transformation. That alone is the way to live. The journey is demanding because he walked this demanding path himself. Discipleship means living in Spirit-transformed ways we would not otherwise experience. Once a disciple comes to realize the kingdom Jesus came to announce does contain the cosmic power for salvation for all people and all creation, then we cannot overstate the claim its call has on someone’s life.  We cannot exaggerate enough the demands of this kingdom and the gracious Father who through our Lord Jesus Christ has saved us from darkness bringing us into light. That’s a message for our times.