This sermon was preached at All Saints Church, Oakham on Sunday 25th June 2023.
Matthew 10:24-39
Who are you going to choose? Jesus or your family?
Jesus, the gentle and kind Prince of Peace, says to his disciples, ‘I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.’[1] ‘I beg your pardon, Jesus! Not peace, but a sword?’
Last week we saw Jesus call the twelve disciples and in today’s reading, he continues giving his instructions to the twelve before sending them out. So far in the gospel of Matthew, we have seen Jesus do a lot teaching and healing. All very good and kind things. We even had the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) in which Jesus talked about the Beatitudes, not retaliating an eye for an eye, love your enemies, and the Golden Rule. We don’t know where the Sermon (or Sermons) on the Mount come in the chronology of Jesus’ ministry but I would hazard a guess that the twelve disciples had heard Jesus talk about some of these things at this point, even if only in part. So, imagine their surprise when Jesus says after his talk about love and mercy, that he now says, ‘I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.’[2] Some of us might feel the same surprise. Who here has ever noticed Jesus saying this?
Jesus says, ‘I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.’[3] And then he goes onto talk about where this sword will be used. He says, ‘For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household.’[4] What on earth is Jesus getting at now? Surely if a sword was going to be taken to anyone it would be the Romans, the ruling and oppressing power over the Jews. They were the Jewish enemy. Yet Jesus says that he brings fighting within our families with our parents and children and our siblings. How does this add up? The Romans are the enemies not our families. But still Jesus says that his disciples, the twelve, you and me, will fight against father and mother, son and daughter, sister and brother.
In the Jewish culture of Jesus’ day, family relations were the strongest bonds that a person had. More than love, or friendship, family was the most important thing. You would never do anything to turn against your family. Your family always comes first. You would put them ahead of your friends, your work, and even yourself. Maybe some of you can recognise this in your own family dynamic. I know that Indian families can often be like that, where the needs of the family are prioritised over your own needs. It would be crazy to say to your parents I disagree with you and I am going to do something different or follow a different path.
So, Jesus saying that the disciples were to turn against their family would be the most catastrophic thing you could say to a Jew. He knew that this would go against the most important relationship in Jewish society and would have pained the ears of the twelve to hear this. How can I turn from my family? they would say.
Jesus was a good Jew as well, and he knew what he was asking of them. He knew that it was counter-cultural. He knew that it was like taking a sword to your own family member. This would only make sense to the disciples if it was about something or someone more important than family. Following Jesus was the more important thing. Jesus is more important than family. He was the new number one priority.
Let me say this now. Jesus’ message is one of peace, but it is not one of keeping the peace. Rather Jesus came to turn over tables and transform our lives and the world by establishing the kingdom of God. Jesus’ way fought against the ways of the world. It was counter-cultural compared to the world. Jesus took a sword to pride, greed, selfishness and every other sin. These sins are widely present in our broken world and can be found in the heart of every person at some point or another. It’s in every father, mother, son, daughter, sister and brother. Our families are good but can sometimes be the vessels of worldly brokenness and sin, and if that is the case, Jesus wants us to know that if it’s a choice between choosing him or your family, you should choose Jesus.
My great-grandfather, Rehemat, was a priest back in India. He didn’t grow up in a Christian family. But when he was a teenager, he came to know Christ and chose to follow him. His family didn’t want him to become a Christian. They said to him that if you become a Christian then you are no longer a part of this family. This was terrible. He loved his family and didn’t want to lose them. However, he was left with a choice between his family and Jesus, and Rehemat chose to follow Jesus. So, when he became a Christian, his family kicked him out. Rehemat had to make a choice between whether he was going to choose doing what his family were calling him to do or to turn against their wishes in order to follow Jesus. It would have been like taking a sword to his family, to his mum and dad, but that was the cost of what it meant to following Jesus. My great-grandfather knew that he had found something more important, more valuable than family and he wasn’t going to give it up.
Many of us do not face being kicked out of our homes and disowned by our families for being a Christian, though I recognise that this might be the case for some of us here this morning. However, we all face some opposition to our faith in Christ. Each of us experiences times when family, friends, work and life pull us away from Christ. Who here has seen their teenagers swap Sunday morning church for Sunday morning sports? Or who here has friends who gossip and try to draw you into slandering people? Or who has family who say you are stupid to believe in God and that if you keep this Jesus nonsense up then everyone will think you are weird?
Or even opposition from other Christians? I’m considered quite young in ministry at 27, and as you know, my sense of calling to the ministry goes back a long while. There were many Christians who said to me with good intentions, ‘You are too young to go into ministry, you need to go and get some more life experience (whatever that means).’ Don’t get me wrong, I do recognise that life experience is incredibly valuable to ministry. However, each of these people were speaking more from a place of human wisdom rather than listening to what God was calling me to with my life right now. I had to choose to stick with this calling to ministry that God was giving me at this young age even though it went against what a lot of other Christians said to me.
In each of these situations, you are called to choose between Jesus and the world, Jesus and your family and friends. What do you choose when you face these situations? Your family? I wouldn’t blame you. It’s hard to go against your family, especially when you don’t want to. However, we need to remember that Jesus calls to make us his number one priority, and that means choosing him over family if they are calling us away from Jesus.
Jesus says: ‘Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me.’[5]
Jesus was a Rabbi and the practice of a Rabbi is that their disciples would go with them everywhere in order to take everything in from them. The Rabbi was their number one priority. This is the kind of life that Jesus is calling us to as his disciples. Our whole lives are governed and centred around him. To be a disciple is to have this total commitment to your Rabbi. Nothing less will do. Only when we make Jesus our number one priority are we worthy to be called his disciples. Yes, we get it wrong and make mistakes, but a true disciple is one who even in their mistakes, keeps Jesus as their number one priority and strives to live like this (even if we get it wrong sometimes).
Jesus loves us so much that he gave his life up for us on a cross. That was his commitment to our relationship with him. What is our commitment to him? Will we give our lives to him? Will we take up our cross to follow him? When push comes to shove, it all comes down to this. Is Jesus your number one priority, or is your family or something else? Will you keep your life as it is defined by the world? Because if you do then you will lose out on the fullness of life with Christ. If you lose your worldly life for Christ’s sake, then you will find full and new life in him now and for eternity. ‘Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.’[6] Any relationship only works when each person is fully committed to one another. But who are you committed to? We know that marriages fail when the other person stop see their spouse as their number one love and priority in their life. The same applies to our relationship with Jesus. It only works when we are fully committed to him. We already know Jesus is fully committed to us – he gave his life for us. But are you committed to him?
Who are you going to choose? Jesus or your family? Jesus or the world? The choice is yours. But if you want to be a follower and disciples of Jesus, I think you know what the answer is. Who are you going to choose?
Amen.
[1] Matthew 10:34 [NRSV].
[2] Matthew 10:34 [NRSV].
[3] Matthew 10:34 [NRSV].
[4] Matthew 10:35-36 [NRSV].
[5] Matthew 10:37-38 [NRSV].
[6] Matthew 10:39 [NRSV].
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Shakeel Nurmahi 