Now

Read Matthew 8:18-23, Mark 4:35-6:6
 
Matthew 8:18-21 When Jesus saw the crowd around him, he instructed his disciples to cross to the other side of the lake. 19 Then one of the teachers of religious law said to him, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.” 20 But Jesus replied, “Foxes have dens to live in, and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place even to lay his head.”
 
“I can’t wait to be a football player,” exclaimed the adolescent teen. “Catching a pass and running for a touchdown will make me a hero!”
   I wonder what this “football disciple” thought when he went to his first practice and had to run wind sprints for 20 minutes, do 20 minutes of hard calisthenics, including the grim “up-downs”. I wonder what he thought when he was tackled for the first time, and his ribs shifted to the right. I wonder if he was still excited when he put on his sweaty jersey from the day before and the smell nearly caused unconsciousness. Do you think he still wanted to play the game, to be a hero?
   If he was a real player, he did. Real players see the demanding work, the sweat, and the pain as the means to the goal - literally. A real player embraces the work because he knows it is the only way to be a player who can win.
   The teacher was excited to follow Jesus because of our Lord’s great healings. Maybe he would have those same victories over disease and become a hero, too. But Jesus warned him. To follow Jesus means soul-crunching, sweaty sacrifice. It meant hard, brutal work to battle those who want to destroy you. Are you still willing? If you’re a real disciple, you are.
 
Matthew 8:21-22 Another of his disciples said, “Lord, first let me return home and bury my father.” 22 But Jesus told him, “Follow me now. Let the spiritually dead bury their own dead.” 
 
ARE you likely to say, “A bit impatient, aren’t you, Jesus? Can’t the man have a few hours to bury his father?” Could it be Jesus’ urgent demand keeps us, too, from following Jesus?
   But the disciple may have been indefinitely delaying his commitment. The man’s father could have been alive, and he was telling Jesus he could follow him when his father died sometime in the future. “I’ll follow you when I’m ready.”
   Second, Jesus wants us to know we really don’t have time for ourselves when we are his disciple. This doesn’t mean we are active continually, always busy about some kingdom work. But it does mean following Jesus is to pursue him through the various means of grace all the moments of our lives. If we aren’t pursuing Jesus through a disciplined life, we are pursuing something that will distract and possibly stop our walk with Christ.
   The context of this Scripture passage is to affirm that we must always be disciplined about living the gospel. Remember, our natural lives point us away from Jesus. We are also falsely taught we can approach God in our own way and rely on our self for the truth. Too easily we put Jesus aside with our own reasons, to say, “Later, Jesus.”
   But Jesus doesn’t want you later. He calls you now. The truth is that, “Yes, I’m here, Lord. Send me.” is the only proper response to Jesus’s call. After all, he is Lord of all – even you.