Luke 14:25-33
8 September 2013
Hate's a very strong word, isn't it?
It can indeed be used in a strong context - e.g 'hate crime': the way people are so controlled, possessed, by an emotion to the extent that they become unreasonable, anti-social or even worse - violent and vindictive.
But that's not the way the word is used in our Gospel this morning (Luke 14.25-33). It isn't so much a milder meaning as a different meaning.
By a milder use of the word 'hate' we can mean something like: I hate coffee, I hate feeling sad, I hate getting up in the morning.
However, in our Gospel we have an even further understanding of its meaning. We might say it is to do with passion. But, as someone once said - do not confuse passion with emotion.
Passion means you have an abiding, deep-rooted interest in something. Like a strong undercurrent, it can be barely discernible sometimes. You are drawn to something, driven by something, fascinated by something, to the extent that you cannot help but allow who you are and what you do to be somehow - not controlled by that something - but perhaps informed by it. Nurtured by it. Helped to grow as an individual, as a human being, by it.
And that's what we have here. Jesus isn't saying, in order to follow him you must hate your mother, father, brother, sister... how does that fit in, in any case, with Jesus' command to love our neighbour?
No, we are at risk of misinterpreting this scripture passage to suggest that we are commanded to hate others - in order to love God.
Whereas what Jesus is saying, I believe, is this.
God should be your passion. Should be your passion above family ties. Family & friendship ties are wonderful, important, powerful and should remain so, but a greater passion should be to want to be guided by, formed by, live one's life in, God and all that God wants, desires for you.
Today in our main service, we are celebrating our Patron. St Mary, mother of Jesus. She didn't love her family less, she didn't love Joseph less. But when she said 'yes' to the Archangel Gabriel - to God - when she agreed to carry God's son, it was done willingly and with a strong undercurrent of passion to live for, and do well by, God.
This was despite the problems and shame it could well bring her in terms of what her family and the village community would think of her. After all, unmarried women who fell pregnant in those days could be stoned to death. But she allowed herself to be called by God to do the service God wanted her to do. An act of will informed by her passion. That's the kind of passion Jesus is inviting us to think about and to work with in our gospel reading this morning.
That's the kind of passion God asks of all of us. Not to hate anyone, but to love God completely and loyally and willingly.
So that, in the end, the more we practice our calling under God, the easier and easier it becomes to say, along with Mary to God:
Behold the servant of the Lord, let it be to me according to your word.
Amen