Kahu's Manao
Keawala‘i Congregational Church
United Church of Christ (USA)
Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Sunday, June 22, 2008
The Rev. Kealahou C. Alika
“Daring Discipleship”
Matthew 10:24-39
Who? What? When? Where? And why? These are the basic questions that are a part of the lesson we learn from those who have studied the Bible and reflected upon its content and application to our daily living.
As we read the Bible it is important for us to consider each question. By doing so we will be able to apply the Bible's teaching to our lives in appropriate ways.
While it is true that God’s Spirit is able to help us discern how to apply the teachings of the Bible to our own lives, it is also true that it doesn’t hurt any of us to take the time to consider the questions raised so that we may avoid any unforeseeable difficulties. Who among us has not heard the story of the young man who was puzzled when he decided to seek out an answer to his problems by opening the Bible and pointing at random to text on the page only to read, “Judas hung himself.”
He could make no sense out of the verse and so he tried again. This time he opened and pointed and found the place where it was written, “Go and do likewise.”
Our readings from The Gospel According to Matthew are likely to provoke many of us today to protest its harshness when it comes to the choice we must make to be disciples or followers of Jesus Christ. But by looking at “the who, what, when, where, and why of the text” we will be able to come to a clearer understanding of the writer’s intent.
The first question we must ask is: "Who was Matthew?" Although The Gospel According to Matthew bears the same name as one of the original twelve disciples, the writer of the gospel was an unknown person who recorded his account of Jesus’ life 90 years after Jesus’ death. Given the writer’s command of the Greek language, evidence of rabbinic training and a clear theological outlook, it has been suggested that he may have been a Jewish Christian of the second generation.
It is likely that he was a member of the church at or near Antioch of Syria - what was then the third largest city of the Roman Empire. It was a center of Greek culture and a commercial hub.
Jews lived in Antioch from the time it was founded in 300 BCE. It was conquered by Rome in 64 BCE. Jews who lived in Antioch were able to observe their own customs.
There were numerous synagogues attended both by Jews and large numbers of Gentiles. The first Jewish war that occurred between 64-73 CE saw a conflagration of anti-Jewish riots but on the whole Judaism enjoyed a peaceful life and it was in this setting that the early Christian church came into being and flourished.
What was the writer of Matthew concerned about? As the years went by numerous controversies and conflicts surfaced between Jewish and Gentile Christians. The writer of Matthew was left with the task of reinterpreting and drawing together the competing traditions of each group. The struggle to deal with the controversies and conflicts eventually compelled the writer to make clear that the center of the faith was Jesus Christ. It was a bit of a balancing act to preserve the “new and the old” but that is precisely what the writer did (Matthew 13:52).
When the writer of Matthew records his gospel in 90 CE, he is aware that new pressures are being exerted by the Roman imperial government against the church. Both Jewish and Gentile Christians now face persecution.
But there is also increasing tension among Jewish and Gentile Christians. It is within the context of all of these controversies, conflicts, persecutions and tensions that the writer calls attention to the promise and cost of discipleship.
What troubles the writer more than anything is the way in which fear seems to threaten the lives of those who are a part of the church. There is the fear of public slander (Matthew 10:25). There is the fear created by those who can kill (Matthew 10:28) and there is the fear of not being valued by God (Matthew 10:29-31).
Despite all such fears the writer of Matthew calls upon those who are a part of the church in Antioch to remain steadfast in their commitment to remain faithful disciples. To know that God cares becomes the source of strength that will undergird all that they will say and do in the name of Jesus.
Like the early disciples we are each called to follow Jesus. The cost? If we must turn away from our fathers and mothers, the writer seems to be saying, “Then let it be so.” If we must leave our families behind, “Then let it be so.”
Was Jesus really calling upon those in the early church to abandon their families? It would seem that way given the immediacy with which all of the twelve disciples responded leaving their boat and fishing nets, other work, and family. Yet we know those who study language and the use of various forms of speech look upon the call to love Jesus, take up the cross, and follow him at the expense of rejecting one’s own family as a hyperbole – an exaggerated statement meant to convey a point; in this case to be mindful that we share a calling and a purpose that may not always be welcomed by others.
The writer of Matthew may have been mindful that his readers were well aware of the cost of their discipleship because of the persecution they were already suffering. That may be why he seems to soften a similar text that appears in The Gospel According to Luke in which the word hate is used.
Where the writer of Luke writes: "Whoever does not hate his father or mother . . . " Matthew writes: "Whoever loves father or mother more than me . . . " It is this distinction between the writers of Matthew and Luke that should offer a caution to us as we think about our families.
Having said this we know there may be occasions when our commitment to be disciples or followers of Jesus Christ may bring us into conflict with others in our communities, at school or at church; even within our own families. This was true for those in the early church and it is true for us today. The writer of Matthew reminds us that whether we are disciples of Jesus Christ in the first century or the twenty-first century, we need not fear.
God is good and forgiving, abounding in steadfast love. God is great and does great things.
Thanks be to God. Amen.