Theme: Beyond Accounting
This week’s lessons focus on the high price of new relationships that must be paid to follow Christ.
Scripture: Luke 14:26
Yesterday we concluded by offering another way to understand our passage, which was that Jesus was speaking in hyperbole; that is, he was intentionally exaggerating in order to make a point.
But there are a number of reasons for thinking that this may be too facile a handling.
Yesterday we concluded by offering another way to understand our passage, which was that Jesus was speaking in hyperbole; that is, he was intentionally exaggerating in order to make a point.
But there are a number of reasons for thinking that this may be too facile a handling. For one thing, it is probably not a proper interpretation of the word “worthy” in Matthew 10. We take that word lightly. “No one is worthy of Christ,” we think, and we dismiss it. That is probably not what Jesus meant. When He said, “Anyone who fails to do so-and-so is not worthy of me,” He probably meant precisely what He said in Luke 14:26, namely, “he cannot be my disciple,” which means, “he cannot be saved.”