Disciple Troubles

 

The writer of Luke’s Gospel is neither ashamed nor afraid to let us know that there were troubles with the disciples. 

I’m not talking about the one who betrayed Jesus.  Nor am I talking about the wild and impulsive personalities--- the thunder and lightening cousins or the one who sometimes spoke faster than he thought. 

Luke lets us see that some troubles just come with the territory of following Jesus.  Luke’s revealing honesty helps us recognize some of our own troubles as disciples and think about how we might compensate we seek faithfully to follow Jesus.

1

 The first trouble that comes with the territory arises from the fact that Jesus’ disciples are realists: everyday practical people. 

 They had been listening to Jesus all day.  Their minds could only absorb as much….  How does that saying go?  Anyway, it’s late in the day.  The troops are getting restless.  “Jesus.  It’s near dinner time.  Send the crowds away so they can get something to eat.” 

 Remember the television commercial---player with his tongue hanging out panting, “Gee Coach---you look like you need some Gator-Aide.” What’s the unspoken message here?  I’m thinking, “Jesus, give it a rest.  We’re all just a little hungry here.” 

 “So, you feed them,” says Jesus.  “What?  We don’t have that kind of bread.”  “Just start,” says Jesus.  What matters is not how everyone got fed.  What matters is that Jesus said to his disciples, “You feed them.”

 Don’t you love it when Paul Snipes stands up here monthly during the “What’s Next?” He reminds us to bring non-perishable food items on the first Sunday of the month.  “Some people are not as fortunate as we are,” he says. 

 OK, I’m not hungry.  And last month I forgot about the food pantry when I was trolling the aisles of COSTCO.  I don’t like being made to feel guilty but that’s another problem (mine more so than Paul’s.)  What is Paul doing?  He is bringing God’s word to us---You feed them!  It’s Jesus’ word to his disciples.  It’s God’s word to us.  Thank you Paul.

 And there may be another Paul-like person among us, even today, who hears and sees, and who is about to lead us somehow in responding to hunger at yet a deeper level than we have so far. 

 Whoever you are, come forward!  Don’t hold back.  The disciples were right---the people are hungry and we---are hungry for leadership!

 2

 A second trouble comes with the territory.  It is the diversion from central purpose that comes from wondering just how great you might really be. 

 The disciples argued among themselves who was the greatest.  It was heady business.  They had exercised power over demons, disease and now hunger, at least temporarily, had been alleviated.  It must naturally have occurred to them that in some sense they were special. 

 Isn’t this common though?  God gives us the ability to be faithful in a given situation or circumstance.  It didn’t feel exceptional at the time.  It just seemed like the right thing to do. 

 Do you know about Powder Milk Biscuits?  This mythical company sponsors the radio show “Prairie Home Companion.”  Their product, Power Milk Biscuits, “gives shy people the strength to do what needs to be done.”  It’s a metaphor for Holy Spirit.  God empowers ordinary people to rise to the occasion.

 Others marvel.  “That was great,” they say.  We wonder, “Was it great?  Was I great?” We remember whatever it was we did or participated in as if the principal actor was someone else in a dream. 

 Day dreaming in this way, we can be easily diverted from God’s call which is simply to keep doing, to the best of our God given ability, what needs to be done. 

 We, like the disciples, begin to think not of God’s inclusive love and gracious care but rather of ourselves.  Stereotypically at least, men and women are said to experience this problem a little differently (men as pride, women as low self-esteem.)  Either way, preoccupation with self is a diversion from the central work of Christian discipleship.  It’s a trouble that arises for disciples.

 Charles DeGaulle declared “I am France.”  It was theatre.   Mohammed Ali danced around the ring.  “I am the greatest.”  No one was going to dispute him.  It’s a metaphor for becoming distracted with oneself rather than staying focused on God. 

 3

 The diversion of attention from God to oneself is connected to the third disciple trouble which is not doing what God has already empowered the disciple to do.

 Jesus sent the disciples out with complete power over demons and diseases.  They returned with great excitement telling Jesus all that they had been able to do. 

 Just a bit later in the narrative, Luke says that while Jesus was away, the disciples, when begged to exorcise a demon, would not, could not,  or in any case, did not do so. 

 There is no suggestion here that some demons are just too big for ordinary disciples.  Nor is it suggested that Jesus either short changed them or repossessed the power.  Luke says, “Jesus gave them complete power over demons and diseases.” 

 When push came to shove and when Jesus was not physically with them, they did not do what he had empowered them to do.

 The disciple trouble was not limited to the failure of the fist disciples but continued into Luke’s day.  Stepping step from the story, we remember that it grounded in Luke’s Christian community forty years after the Passion of Jesus. 

 Jesus was not physically with Luke’s community.  In continuity with Jesus’ first circle, Luke’s community had had received the Spirit of Jesus.  They been empowered to confront and expel demons.

 It is not difficult to imagine that disciples in Luke’s community of faith were unable to accomplish what needed to be done.  They were shy, distracted, whatever.  That which the community had the power to do, it did not do.  “How long must I be with the faithless generation,” exclaimed Luke’s Jesus. 

 This lament echoed not just across the decades that separated Jesus and Luke’s community but resounds two thousand years into our day.  We are disciples of Jesus.  We have received the Spirit.  We have been given complete power over demons and diseases.  How do we exercise this power?  When do we exercise it?

 Here is a perverse thought:  President Bush, public Christian and leader of the free world, believed the Iraqi strongman was evil, demonic or possessed by demons.  Why didn’t the President gather eleven more believers and go to Baghdad to confront the demons rather than send thousands of young surrogates to kill and be killed? 

 It sounds ludicrous doesn’t it?  Is it ludicrous because Jesus hasn’t given us power to do what needs to be done?  Is it ludicrous because we don’t believe?  Well, it’s a disciple issue.  

 There are Christians by the way (and other people of good will) who would do what I just described.  They would have gone, offering themselves, their lives, and their faith in a non-violent active confrontation of evil.  Lives would have been lost.  Probably, not as many.  And life might have been won.

 4

 This, of course, leads to a further disciple trouble.  Shortly after Jesus’ disciples were unable to exorcise a demon they encountered someone not of their group who was exorcising demons.  Since he was not one of them, they forbade him to continue and reported this to Jesus.  Jesus rebuked them.  If he is not against us, he is for us.  In other words, the important thing is the work, doing what need to be not, not the affiliation.

 What matters is the building of a peaceable kingdom.  What matters is the sharing of resources and caring for the planet.  What doesn’t matter is whether one is affiliated as a Baptist, Presbyterian, Catholic, Buddhist, Mormon or Muslim.

 I had a teacher once who said that there are no final solutions.  One solution leads to a new set of, hopefully more interesting, troubles.  Luke helps us see that for disciples there are also troubles, some that come with the territory. 

 Help me focus on the peaceable kingdom, on the reign of God, on what’s next and on doing what needs to be done.  Let us help one another---may God help us.