The Rev. Brad Sullivan
Lord of the Streets, Houston
June 29, 2025
Proper 8, C
Galatians 5:1,13-25
Psalm 16
Luke 9:51-62
So, discipleship of Jesus determines how we live our lives. It means giving up some of our desires for something even greater. It can take us time and practice, fits and starts to really start following Jesus well as his disciples, and like anything worth doing, we keep at it, even when we mess up on the way.
Look at Jesus’ disciples in the story we heard from Luke 9. Back in Luke 6, Jesus had told his disciples to love their enemies and bless those who curse them. Then, we heard today that when some folks rejected Jesus and his teachings, two of his disciples, James and John, were very zealous, and they wanted to call down fire from Heaven and kill them all. “Lord, those people rejected you. They’re our enemies now, right? We don’t like them. Let’s kill them all” No, guys, Jesus said. That’s not the way.
James and John were Jesus’ disciples, but they really weren’t understanding what his way of life truly meant. “Love your enemies.” Ok, sure, but we should also kill all our enemies, right?
See, they wanted to gratify their desires for revenge and their feelings of self-righteousness. “Those guys rejected Jesus. Now we’re angry. We’ll feel better if we destroy them.” They probably would have felt better, too, more powerful, less afraid, like nothing could stop them or harm them, but that’s not the way of Jesus. Power, revenge, killing, seeking what we want for our sake, regardless of the cost to others…that’s the way of Satan, the adversary, and those who live according to such ways, Jesus said, aren’t fit or ready for the kingdom of God.
After Jesus rebuked James and John, we heard three stories of people who wanted to be Jesus’ disciples, but they didn’t want to change; they didn’t want to give up their own desires. They weren’t ready to let go of some of their own power and control for the sake of others.
“Lord, I want to follow you,” one guy said. Ok, sounds good, but realize your true home will be the kingdom of God, so all other homes you make in this world will be secondary.
See, if we follow Jesus, then our allegiance is first to Jesus, and our home will not be a nation, nor a flag, nor a political party. Our home will not be a gang, nor a family, nor even ourselves. Now, we don’t have to divorce ourselves of our families. We get to still love and live with them. We get to care about our nation. We get to and should care about ourselves.
When any of these come into conflict with following Jesus, however, we don’t get to rest in those things and chose those ways over the ways of Jesus. Our homes aren’t in our nation, our flag, our political party. Our homes aren’t in a gang, our family, or even in ourselves. Our homes are in Jesus, the ways he taught, and the faith he kept.
“Lord, I want to follow you,” another man said, “but first I want to bury my parents.” Ok, his parents probably weren’t dead yet. He was likely worried that following Jesus was just going to be too messy. His parents may not've liked the idea of him following this weird upstart preacher from Nazareth. "Just give me 20, 30 years tops, Jesus, and then I'll absolutely follow you."
Jesus’ response to him is basically, “Why wait?” Do you think your parents won’t want you to follow Jesus? Do you fear your friends or others around you will think you are soft or weak if you follow Jesus’ ways instead of their ways? Would it be difficult or uncomfortable to let people know that you’re no longer into vengeance, that you truly believe Jesus’ teachings about love your enemies and bless those who curse you?
Finally, there’s they guy who said, “Lord, I want to follow you, but let me say goodbye to my family first.” Hold up, guys. You can’t look backwards if you’re going to plow a field. The plow would go all over the place instead of in a straight line, and you’d mess everything up. Besides, you don’t need to say goodbye. You don’t need to sever ties with your family, or your friends. You can follow Jesus and still love your family and friends. If they reject you, so be it, but you needn’t leave them forever. You don’t need to say “to hell with them” or ask fire to come down from heaven and consume them just because they’re not following Jesus.
Jesus was letting folks know that the world is pretty screwed up, and the time to follow him is right now. You may not be ready, but at least start; at least try. James and John and the rest of the disciples, they all screwed up. They weren’t exactly ready, but they tried. They kept at it. Why? Why follow Jesus? Well, we know the alternatives.
We know what happens when we ask fire to come down from heaven. We drop bombs. We make enemies. We simply can’t kill enough people to make ourselves safe. There are always people who care about the folks who are killed, and they’re always going to want revenge. We’re not really making ourselves safe when we drop bombs. We’re just passing the danger on to future generations. Love your enemies doesn’t sound so stupid when we really think about it.
We follow Jesus because we know the alternatives. We know what happens when we have several thousand billionaires in our country with more wealth than 99% of all other people in the nation. We end up with 40% of everyone in our nation struggling to get by, living in poverty, and weeks away from homelessness at any time.
We know what happens when we do all we can to increase the wealth of the rich while doing less and less to bring the poor out of poverty. We end up with the kind of economy we have now, with a shrinking middle class, thousands of billionaires, and 40% of Americans being weeks away from homelessness at any moment.
That’s what happens when allegiance to nation, party, economic ideals, and desires for more come before following Jesus. Several thousand billionaires with 40% of Americans at risk of homelessness every day. 40% of Americans struggling to get by, struggling in school, constantly stressed, worried, fighting, angry. That’s the result of placing wealth, and party, and even some conception of our nation ahead of following Jesus.
Following Jesus means giving up our selfish goals, our selfish desires, and even our self, Jesus said, in order to live in a way that serves others. Geddy Lee, Canadian singer and bassist for the band, Rush had something to say about living in a way that serves others. In his recent book, "My Effing Life," he said of Canada, “Sure, we pay more taxes than many others do, but I prefer to live in a world that gives a shit, even for people I don't know.” A wealthy man happy to pay a large percentage in taxes because he understands and cares about how much that helps others. He’s not even a disciple of Jesus, but he’s certainly following Jesus’ ways in that.
Following Jesus determines how we live our lives. It means giving up some of our selfish goals, our selfish desires, and even our self, for something even greater: the kingdom of God in which we do give a shit about others, even people we don’t know; the kingdom of God in which we love and follow Jesus by loving and caring for others. Following Jesus can take time and practice, in fits and starts, and like anything worth doing, we keep at it, even when we mess up on the way.
