1: 16 While walking
by the Sea of Galilee, Jesus saw the brothers Simon and Andrew casting their
nets into the sea, since they fished by trade. 17 Jesus said to them, “Follow
me; I will make you fishers of humankind.” 18 They immediately abandoned their nets
and followed Jesus.
19 Proceeding a little further along, Jesus
saw the brothers James and John Bar-Zebedee. They too were in their boat,
putting their nets in order. 20 Immediately Jesus called them, and they left
their father Zebedee standing in the boat with the hired help, and went off in
the company of Jesus
2:13 Jesus went out
again and walked along the lake shore, but people kept coming to him in crowds
to listen to his teachings. 14 As he passed by, Jesus saw Levi, ben-Alphaeus,
sitting in the tax office. Jesus said, “Follow me,” and Levi got up and
followed him. 15 While Jesus was
reclining to eat in Levi’s house, many other tax collectors and notorious
“sinners” joined him and the disciples at dinner. There were many people
following Jesus. 16 When the religious scholars who belonged to the Pharisee
sect saw that he was eating with tax collectors and sinners, they complained to
the disciples, “Why does the teacher eat with these people?” 17 Overhearing the
remark, Jesus said to them, “People who are healthy don’t need a doctor; sick
ones do. I have come to call sinners, not the righteous.”
10:46 They came to
Jericho. As Jesus was leaving Jericho with the disciples and a large crowd, a
blind beggar named Bartimaeus ben-Timaeus, was sitting at the side of the road.
47 When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout and to say,
“Heir of David, Jesus, have pity on me!” 48 Many people scolded him and told
him to be quiet, but he shouted all the louder, “Heir of David, have pity on me!”
49 Jesus stopped and said, “Call him here.” So they called the blind man.
“Don’t be afraid,” they said. “Get up; Jesus is calling you.” 50 So throwing
off his cloak, Bartimaeus jumped up and went to Jesus. 51 Then Jesus said,
“What do you want me to do for you?” “Rabbuni,” the blind man said, “I want to
see.” 52 Jesus replied, “Go, your faith has saved you.” And immediately
Bartimaeus received the gift of sight and began to follow Jesus along the road
(the way).
What
does it mean to follow? Today we follow directions given to us by our GPS
devices. When we lose our way or deviate from the planned course, the (almost)
exasperated voice tells us, “Recalculating route.” So we learn to follow
directions, follow a recipe, and (if we have the willpower) to follow a diet.
But what does it mean in the 21st century to follow Jesus?
In
childhood we played follow the leader. A little more challenging game was Marco
Polo where a blindfolded person was “it” and was guided (or misguided) by
spoken signals. Jesus is a good bit more elusive as a leader in our daily
lives. Most of us do not see or hear him directly.
I
think that most people in Western culture assume that following Christ means
signing on to a set of rules and behaviors and beliefs. The bible is seen as a
rule book that governs the game. In previous generations the rules were clear:
no drinking alcohol, no dancing, no movies, no cards or gambling, no cussing
(some peripheral rules were given religious authority: no mixing of races,
women were inferior and subject to men, and your government had God’s blessing
and approval). The beliefs were equally clear: Jesus was the Son of God
(actually meaning more God than human), who gave the sacrifice of his life for
your sins so you could go to heaven. It was A + B = C. A – if you believed in
Jesus and B. you behaved appropriately (followed the rules) then C. you were a
Christian.
Marcus
Borg points out that in the earliest descriptions of the followers of Jesus,
there was no talk about rules. It was not an exercise of conforming to a list
of behaviors set in stone (or inerrant ink in a holy book). Rather, it was a
Way. “The gospel as ‘the way of jesus’ suggests a path and a person to be
followed, and not primarily a set of beliefs to be believed.” (Conversations with
the Gospels, p.22)
The
call stories of the first disciples and of Levi are fascinating for the
conversations they do not have. Jesus says, “follow me.” None of them ask,
“Why?” “I will make you fishers of humankind” is hardly a detailed plan of
action, much less a job offer with retirement and health benefits. To be sure,
Jesus himself must have had an intense charisma if these call stories are at
all historically accurate. Why else would someone respond by leaving their
father and hired hands sitting in the boat? But beyond Jesus’ personal
charisma, did they ever ponder the “what” and the why for” of the call to
follow? What did they think “follow me” meant? What do we think it means?
Borg
points out that the earliest name for Christians was “Followers of the Way.” The
Gospel of Mark begins with a quote from Isaiah that proclaims “Prepare the Way
of our God. Clear a straight path for God.” Borg says Mark is announcing one of
the themes of this gospel: the Way. Ancient Greek does not differentiate the
way that English does on this. Path, road, and way are all separate words in
English, but they are all used to translate the same word in the Greek. The
first Christians may well have been the Followers of the Path, or those “On the
Road.”
That
being the case, Simon and Andrew, James and John, Levi and Bartimaeus were
likely not signing up for an agenda or a couse of action. When they followed Jesus,
they set their direction. Remember that the very first thing Jesus called
people to in verse 1:15 was to “repent,” to change your hearts and lives.
Literally, to change direction.
The
story of Bartimaeus is the most clear on this. He first calls out to Jesus to
cure his blindness. Jesus stops and restores Bartimaeus’ sight. Mark tells us: “And immediately Bartimaeus received the gift
of sight and began to follow Jesus along the road.” Again, along the road,
or the path , or The Way (in fact, anytime a road or path is mentioned in Mark
it can be seen as a footnote reminding us that we are on a journey of spirit
and transformation). When he can see clearly (and Mark is using this blindness
and sight as a metaphor for those who come to see Christ clearly), Bartimaeus is
on the way with Jesus, even though that road leads to Jerusalem and all that
will happen there.
The
early followers of Christ were not followers of rules or behaviors and certainly
not of a set of beliefs. They had committed themselves to the way that Jesus
lived because they saw that way as tho one that could transform their lives and
transform the world. They set out on a journey of transformation.
A
lot of people today have an intense realization that the world needs to change.
Along with that, many understand that the transformation of the world begins
with a changed heart. What if Christianity was seen as an invitation to a
journey of transformation instead of as a litmus test of beliefs? Instead of
escaping Hell and securing admittance to Heaven, what if Christianity were seen
as a way of living in the world that made life worth living and offered the
hope that God is still speaking and working to transform the world through love
and peace and compassion? Hope is reconstructed not as a cosmic cavalry saving
us from suffering or sin or whatever, but as the path to see us through the
worst life has to offer and beckon on to the best.
I
have a clip from the movie “Monte Walsh” that I’ll show you on Wednesday. It is
a movie about the end of the cowboy era in the west. The cattle ranch has been
bought out by an eastern corporation, and the company man is trying to get the
range boss to make the cowboys pay for some damages they caused in fight with the
railroad men. The range boss is trying to explain to the company man why the
cowboys do what they do, that they live by their own rules. “Where are these
rules written down?” the company man asks. The range boss replies: “They’re not
written down, you damn fool. They’re
lived.” I think we got in trouble when we began writing down all our rules.
Following Christ is lived.
This
week is the culminatin of our stewardship campaign, it is Grow One Sunday. We
will be asking our people to make their financial commitments for the coming
year. I am hoping to do so in a way that is much more than asking, “How much
will you give?” It will be an invitation to commit to Jesus’ Way in our world.
Our overall them is Reconstructing Hope. Our invitation will be to ask how each
of us can commit to using our gifts to help build the Kin-dom of God in our
world. Will we live in such a way that helps build the Kin-dom?
Good News: Christ calls us to join the journey of
transformation.
Subject: We are not called to follow a set of rules, but
onto a path, a movement, a way of life.
Igniting Desire: the people should have a desire ignited
in them to get up, to get on the path, to move!
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