GOD FIRST!

We’ve been hearing some very harsh words from Jesus in Luke’s gospel over the past few weeks:  this Sunday Jesus insists that only people willing to “hate” their family and give up all their possessions and risk their lives for the gospel can be disciples.  I did some homework: the English word “hate” is a translation of the Greek word “miseo,” which means to separate oneself from any source of ritual impurity.  It’s an action, not an emotion of revulsion or fury, but an action with consequences.  Anyone who thinks that Jesus is only kind and gentle is in for a rude awakening.

How should we respond to lessons like this, that challenge the core of who we are?  Maybe that’s the point.  When we let family relations or status or possessions or fear define us, we miss the potential for who we are in God’s eyes, and how we can know God’s love more deeply.  I was talking to a dog trainer recently,  who was talking about the stories people have about their pets:  “I found her at the pound just before she was to be killed,” “I inherited her from an ill uncle,” “he must have been abused as a puppy”, etc.  The stories shape the way the people treat their pets—which can be helpful or not.  “Oh, I couldn’t discipline this poor puppy, because he was abused.”  “She always lived in a small apartment—she doesn’t need exercise.”

Most of us also have a story about who we are:  our strengths and our weaknesses, our importance to the world or people around us, our sense of moral rectitude and even how God sees us. Messages from parents, authorities, social norms contribute to our self-definition.   Often we’re not even conscious of what we tell ourselves about who we are.  “I’m a good person (so lying about X is alright).”  “I am worthless unless people love me (so I put appearances first).” 

In chapters 11-15 of Luke Jesus is jolting us, rather rudely, into awareness of how stories we tell about ourselves or others may not square with God’s story or intentions.  Jesus says:  GOD FIRST!  Intentional choices about the ways you care for yourself and your family, or devote to your possessions or career, about how you treat your neighbor or judge yourself or appreciate creation must flow from your trust in God, your desire to know God more, your gratitude for the gifts God continually bestows.

The Bible gives us stories of how people have understood themselves and others in relationship to God, stories of sin and faithfulness, forgiveness and the need for repentance.   Some stories are comforting and inviting:  others are ruthless and violent.  God and Jesus both want to shake us out of complacency whenever daily hopes and concerns dull our commitment to or awareness of God.  Sometimes we can’t hear until the messenger shouts or excoriates habitual actions that we assume, unthinkingly, are “just the way things are.”

From the little I know of the Days of Awe, the ten days from Rosh Hoshanah to Yom Kippur, this is a time for Jews to reexamine their priorities, see where they have been blind to God’s ways, make amends and commit anew to putting God first.  Lessons from the Revised Common Lectionary, a schedule of readings shared by many Christian denominations, seem to be in synch with the invitation? demand? desperate need? for Christians too to shake off the stories of who we are that are no longer helpful, and live into the story God is telling of a life of blessing, healing, and peace for all of creation.  Wake up! Choices matter!  GOD FIRST!

“Leave me not to the tempest of all the meaningful superficialities of my life, O God.  Drive me, drive me o God, to my inmost center where, stripped bare of all that cloys and clutters, I may know Thee even as I know me, [and I may know me in the light of  Thy  love].  This is the heart of the cry of Thy children, O God, holy God, our Father.”  --Howard Thurman, The Centering Moment, (Friends Press, Richmond, Indiana:  1969) p. 15.