Commentaries:
Clearly, following Jesus is neither easy nor risk-free. Its sacrifices and hardships are sometimes severe. It involves a commitment that most people are unwilling to make because true discipleship involves absolute devotion and dedication to Christ Himself. Thus, Jesus said these things, testing these men, finding out what was really in their hearts—if they were willing to commit themselves to Him, His way of life, and His purposes.
In the final verse, He lets us know the bottom line of what is required: One who is fit for God's Kingdom is willing to give all. German clergyman Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who lived under the Nazi regime, wrote a book called The Cost of Discipleship. In it, he sums up the Christian calling with a now well-known quotation, "When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die."
In this passage, Luke records three instances in which someone gives an excuse to refuse Christ's calling to follow Him, illustrating three general areas in which people fail. The first reason is that the Christian life is one of discomfort. Jesus tells the man that He did not have a place to lay His head. In God's Word, Christians are often called "strangers" and "sojourners." We are travelers going through a land or residing only temporarily. In a spiritual sense, we are not citizens of the lands we live in (Philippians 3:20). So, as travelers along the road of life toward the Kingdom of God, we cannot expect to have all the comforts of home.
We cannot allow the accoutrements of this world and of this life to hold us back in our devotion to Christ. Our homes, jobs, vacations, clothes, pastimes—none of these things compare to the importance of this Christian life. We must be willing to forsake all of these things if they inhibit our relationship with God. It may make life uncomfortable, but the rewards are wonderful.
The second reason some fail is that the Christian life is sacrificial. The man asks Jesus if he could first bury his father, but He answers, "No. You go and preach the Kingdom of God." We, because of our calling, must often forsake the customary duties, privileges, associations, and activities of normal life. The Christian's focus, Jesus says, is on the living, those whom God has called and given the truth, whose focus is also on God's work (see John 6:29).
When God calls a person, His will comes first. We may end up "missing out" on many of this world's activities. Some people miss them so much that they feel short-changed by God. Whether we pass or fail on this point depends on our priorities. If our ties to the world and its ways are too strong, we will be unwilling to sacrifice them to follow Christ. To be a true disciple, He says, we have to cut many or most of those ties.
The third reason people refuse Christ's call follows from the second: The Christian life demands new loyalties. The third man wanted to say farewell to his close friends and family. Jesus replies that once we commit to God's way, we cannot turn back, or we will be considered unfit. Many Christians are the only ones called from their particular families. They often find that, over time, they must forsake their own blood to a degree because they discover they have little in common with them. Their ways of life are so dramatically divergent that separation becomes natural. In the church, under a new and better way of life, they find a new identity, a new family, and a new purpose.
It is said that blood is thicker than water, but Jesus warns that our devotion to Him and God's way of life must be stronger. It requires an act of will to make our devotion to Him stronger than our blood ties. The Holy Spirit will not just infuse us to be totally committed to God. We must set our wills to believe and follow through with making God our first priority in life, to go where He says to go. This is the new loyalty that Christ's calling demands.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Called to Follow
The Contemporary English Version (CEV) renders verse 62, "Anyone who starts plowing and keeps looking back isn't worth a thing to God's Kingdom."
Plowing in Jesus' day was done, not with a tractor, but behind an animal, something we have little or no experience doing. Few of us have spent any time walking behind a plow—and a garden tiller does not count as a plow! What was it like trying to keep an animal-pulled plow upright and true? YouTube offers many videos of just this thing: people trying to hold a plow straight and keep a team moving forward. It does not look easy. If the plowman took his eyes off what he was doing, the plow would fall over.
So, once a farmer became proficient enough to hold the plow up and had the animals trained to move ahead, he would have to keep his eyes fixed on the end of the row to plow a straight line. Back in the day, Farmer John would send his son or his hired hand out to plow a field. He would come by later to check on him and perhaps find the furrows crooked. The plowman had started plowing but perhaps kept looking back. He was not committed to the task at hand or was not focused on the goal.
Hebrews 10:39 (CEV) reads, "We are not like those people who turn back and get destroyed. We will keep on having faith until we are saved." Are God's requirements too exacting and difficult for us? Are we committed to the way forward, or are we spending time looking back?
Mike Ford
How Expensive Is Your Religion? (Part One)
In the warnings of possible costs in Luke 9:57-62; 14:25-30, He says we must expect the loss of the respect and association with those we feel the most affection for, family members. They are not going to appreciate the changes we have made in our lives. They are yet blinded because God has not removed the veil covering their spiritual perceptions. This happens to many of us. It occurred in my relationship with my parents.
Jesus warns that our lives may become seriously unstable, as outsiders might judge it. He suggests that the convert may become somewhat itinerant, seeming to have an unsettled existence. He also suggests that following Him would put demands on our lives and time that might cut close family members to the quick, perhaps even turning them into enemies. Christ makes plain that, despite God's well-known mercy, He wants our wholehearted, unreserved loyalty with no yearning ever to turn back to our former lives. It is in meeting challenges like these that the potential costs become realities.
Though not mentioned directly here, Hebrews 11 reminds us of those who were tortured by mocking and scourging, by imprisonment, by stoning, and even by being sawn in two. Others were forced to flee for their lives, wandering destitute and tormented, barely able to clothe themselves. This may not happen to many of us now, but as matters intensify, Jesus warns that people will eventually kill Christians, thinking that they are glorifying God.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Awesome Cost of Love
Other Forerunner Commentary entries containing Luke 9:59:
Luke 9:57-62
Luke 14:25-30
