The Dead

This one is tough. Jesus challenges a person to follow Him, and the person asks permission to first go bury his father. Seems reasonable, right? And Jesus' answer seems predictable. right? Of course, the man should be allowed to go bury his father. If there was ever a reasonable request, this is it, right? There is so much more I would love to know about this situation. Did the man come to ask Jesus to either heal or raise his father from the dead? That seems reasonable. Was the father far from being in need of burying? Was the man simply making an excuse or was this a serious request? Did Jesus see something in this man's heart that needed to be brought out, much like in the case of the rich, young ruler? Was Jesus testing him to see if he would be persistent in his request as in the spirit of Luke 18 and Matt.11? Was Jesus saying this because this man's father and family were openly enemies of Jesus who opposed him? Perhaps if this were the case, the father would not deserve for his Jesus-following Son to honor him by attending his funeral. We could ask questions all day long, but we simply do not know all the circumstances.

But there are a couple of things that do seem clear from this situation. First, how do we seek for interpretations of such obscure events? Do we approach these mysteries with biases of our own? We are having to make judgments without sufficient understandings. So how do we do this? One person might read this and decide that if this is how Jesus is they do not want to follow Him. Others may seek to paint Jesus in the best light and the man in the worse light in order to feel good about continuing to follow Jesus. Others may raise the questions, admit their lack of understanding, defer to Jesus because of who He is without being disparaging of the disciple, and file it away in the mystery category, something I will have to ask about when I see Jesus. Whatever we do with this, it is interesting to see each of us struggle with such stories from Jesus' life, noting that Jesus' answers are not always predictable.

But, we also have to see that Jesus is clear about His priorities, and those who follow Him. Jesus says, "...but as for you, go and proclaim everywhere the kingdom of God." Regardless of what is going on with this man's father, this priority remains. The kingdom must be proclaimed everywhere. It suggests to me the metaphor of a soldier who might request permission for leave, even to attend to the death of a loved one. The decision may seem routine and grantable in every circumstance. But, there is something in the military that always takes precedence and that is the mission. There is a time for mission and a time for personal matters. Didn't Paul say, "No soldier in active service entangles himself in the affairs of everyday life, so that he may please the one who enlisted him as a soldier?" (2 Tim.2:4) There are times when the demands of proclaiming the kingdom will conflict with the demands of everyday life. This is a hard teaching and requires great wisdom, but what is clear is that we do not always defer to the affairs of everyday life. We have to sometimes defer to the kingdom at the sacrifice of everyday life. Matthew 6:33 makes clear that the kingdom is first. Ponder this.