In this weekend's Gospel, Jesus says something troubling. After calling someone to discipleship, the man asks to be allowed to go and bury his father, Jesus responds "Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go out and proclaim the kingdom of God." Huh? How rude of Jesus to prevent a son from burying his father… but that's not the case. Jesus liked to break laws, but he didn't break the Commandments, so it's unlikely that Jesus is encouraging a son not to honor his father.
The traditional interpretation of this passage is that Jesus doesn't accept excuses. A true disciple is one who commits to walking the path of Christ without reservation or regret. This can be seen in the next verse, where Jesus says "No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God." True disciples jump in, as messy as their lives and circumstances may be, they jump ALL the way in.
But as I have been reading this passage I have begun to see a second meaning in it. Jesus can say "let the dead bury the dead" because they ALWAYS WILL. Only the living can bring others to new life, and to be a disciple means to be fully alive!
Christians bury bodies, and if the man in the Gospels simply needed an afternoon to put his father in the ground I am sure that Jesus would have said something like- "Yeah sure, but meet up with us at Mark's mom's house later!" But the man isn't asking to do this, he is asking to be allowed to go back and live "temporarily" the life in which he had no responsibility for helping his father to prepare for ETERNAL LIFE. And Jesus is like, "OH HECK NO!"
As a professional minister I get asked all of the time how to raise young people who love Christ and His Church. The only answer I ever have for this question is that we must be witnesses of our own faith and intentionally be in relationship with them. And when we choose death (a kind of spiritual zombie-hood), we are powerless to do anything but bury our dead young people. But when we REFUSE TO BE DEAD, when we unconditionally-- without reservation and regret-- choose to walk the path of Christ FULLY ALIVE, everyone, not just young people, will RISE.
But when you stop and truly think about the implications of individuals, of families, of Churches and communities standing up and refusing to bury the dead (but still responsibly put bodies in the ground), it suddenly makes the cost of discipleship not seem so high. It becomes easier to stop making excuses… and to that Jesus says, "O HECK YES!!!"
