In our popular culture we have a phrase that goes something like this, “And, it was at that time when I had my ‘coming to Jesus’ moment.” The “coming to Jesus” that people are referring to is usually a moment of seeing the truth, or gaining some sort of clarity in life, and then finally taking a step to turn toward Jesus. The day that I realized that Reese’s Peanut Butter cups were the thing getting in the way of me being healthy and thus becoming the person that God has created me to be could be described as a “coming to Jesus” moment. Just a side note: that particular “coming to Jesus” moment has not really happened for me yet. It is a theoretical “coming to Jesus” moment at this point. But if it ever does happen, you can clearly see that “coming to Jesus” moments usually have some sort of “giving up” or some sort of “loss” attached to them.
It makes me think of the story of a hard working guy, close to retirement, who devoted his life to doing well at work and supporting his family. For weeks, as he walked to his truck to go to work, he would have to walk around to the back of the truck in order to remove the neighboring boy’s bike out from his half of a shared driveway. It annoyed him that the bike was on his half of the drive, and he fanaticized about just running over the thing to teach the kid a lesson. He never did, of course. Every day he would just quietly check for the bike, move it, and grumble on his way to work.
The day of retirement finally came, and along with his day of retirement also came the deep loss of his sense of purpose. He would walk around the house, looking for something to do to keep his mind and hands busy. One day, as he wandered around the house in his new found state of “lostness,” (Is that a word; “Lostness?”) the man glanced out his window and saw a kid who looked to be about four or five sitting on the drive with his small bike. Finally, able to deal with the problem, he went out to have a talk with the kid who had made the start of his working days so miserable.
As he approached, he heard the kid crying.
“What’s wrong?”
“I keep falling and my Dad is not here to teach me.”
“Where’s your Dad?”
The kid points up to the sky.
”Where’s your Mom, can’t she teach you?”
“She’s too sad,” the boy replies.
“I guess…I have the time to teach you.”
And, with that, God took a lost man, paired him with a lost boy, and created something new and loving. It was the man’s “coming to Jesus” moment. It was almost as if the man was required to give up his job and his identity in order for him to see the need of his neighbor. Following Jesus often requires giving up something quite precious to us.
Jesus looks squarely in the eyes of us who come to him seeking to follow, and he teaches us in Luke, chapter 14, verse 33: “None of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.” Wow. Jesus means business with all of this giving up talk. But, before I walk with you down Jesus’ path of giving it all up for the sake of God and for the sake of your neighbor, I want to talk with you first about the benefits. Otherwise, it will just sound like chastising directed down upon you from the pulpit on high. “You need to give up your alcohol for Jesus to want to be near you.” “You need to give up the things you appreciate in life for Jesus to walk with you.” “You need to be someone else in order for Jesus to count you in.” That is not the message that I want you to hear.
What I do want you to hear is the story that immediately follows Jesus’ teaching concerning the need to give up things and people in order to follow. In that story, Jesus is sitting with the people in his culture who had lost everything. He was sitting with the sinners. He was sitting with the hated tax collectors. He was sitting with those who had lost respect and trust and integrity. It was about them that he tells a parable in which a woman who had lost a precious coin rejoices when she searches and finds it. In the same way, while Jesus sits surrounded by people who are utterly lost in life, he tells the tale of a sheep who wanders away and tells how its shepherd leaves the rest of the sheep in order to search and find it. The shepherd rejoices when the sheep is reunited with him and he carries it upon his shoulders like a treasured child.
Do you want to know what you get when you are lost? You get Jesus’ presence. You want to know what you get when everything you rely upon is now gone? You get the embracing arms of the divine? When you have lost it all, you get what your heart has truly desired all along: the one who is “the way, the truth, and the life” sitting and standing and walking right beside you. You get Jesus who has searched and searched and found you. You get the gift of God. That is the benefit.
There are so many things that can stand in the way of your life with God. In sort of a jolt to the system, Jesus points them out in a very dramatic way. “Father and mother,” “wife and children,” “brothers and sisters,” all our “possessions,” and “life itself” can all stand in the way of following Jesus. Jesus asks us to “hate” them all in order to be his disciples. I did not think that Christians were supposed to “hate” anything, but here Jesus is demanding it of us! Of course, Jesus is using exaggeration to make a point here, but it is for a very good reason. It is true.
How many of us have said to ourselves, “I will work hard at this Jesus thing, I promise, but after…” and then you fill in the blank of the after. “I will work hard at following Jesus and loving my neighbor after the children are not so little.” “I will have more time for Jesus after my job lightens up a bit.” “I will finally have time to give after I retire.” “I will finally have the money to help out more after I start making a little bit more.” “I will finally have the finances to help out after I get the car paid off or the mortgage paid down.” These are all excuses that stand in the way.
How do I know all of these excuses so well? It is not because you have come to the church and personally confessed them to me, though you are always welcome to come and confess. I know them well because they have all crossed my own mind.
But, the excuses do not stop there because on the other side of life you start to say to yourself, “I wish that I would have done more of these Jesus things with the kids.” “I wish that I had taken the time to focus on what is important to God rather than dumping all that time into a company that just threw me under the bus anyway.” “I wish I had…” are the words that come out on the other side.
Do you know what is missing in all of this discussion? The present. The present is absent in all of this internal dialogue. We are sheep wandering around, always looking ahead to find greener pastures but getting lost along the way, or turning in lost circles wishing that we had appreciated the pastures we were in.
But, if we would just look around in the present we would see that our shepherd is standing right there next to us, carrying us when we need carrying, and guiding us along when we need guiding. Jesus is sitting with us lost and confused sinners and tax collectors. Sometimes, we need to lose what we are holding onto in order to see what we have. Like that working man, sometimes what is so valuable to us needs to be dropped and shoved away so that we can clearly see the path that God has in store.
Following Jesus can be costly. Being a disciple might mean giving up someone or something that you hold quite dear. It might mean carrying a cross and taking a burden upon yourself for the sake of saving another, just like Jesus did for us. And, it might mean that you find your life…your true life…once again.
I know of a family who suffered a lot of loss in one year. Grandpa died. The husband lost a job. The kids lost a pet. It was one of those snowball years of loss. You know what I mean, where you suffer one loss and then more and more loss until the loss is just one huge, destructive snowball in everyone’s lives. But, what helped this family were some neighbors who would simply drop off some food throughout the week and give a listening ear. It was a simple gift, but it was a gift of love that was so powerful that the family devoted themselves to doing the same. They made it a part of their family meal time to intentionally make extra food at dinner, and then package it up, and deliver it (as a family) to someone they knew was struggling.
Did it break into their normal, nightly family routine? Yes. Did it mean that some sacrifices had to be made? Yes. Did it mean they were disciples, living in the here and now, teaching their children by doing, following Jesus, loving their neighbors, and doing the very things that Jesus did? Yes. They estimated the cost of being a disciple of Jesus Christ, and found that the cost of following Jesus was more than worth it.
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