Hate?

There are roads we travel down where the blacktop disappears as quickly into the rearview mirror as it first appeared when it was just a streak on the horizon.

These roads are the physical reality of a quick trip down to DC to drop off my daughter and they are the figurative understanding that this trip would eventually come to pass.

The time spent in the car in that in-between space of south Jersey on 95.

It is a portion of road that seems long and uninterrupted.

Laid out before me was a blank slate for thoughts about dropping her off, the palette on which to draw memories of a little girl whose hands were once small and needed to be held.

Those hands are full now.

Full of plans for school.

Full of making plans with new acquaintances, they were thinking about going to Georgetown.

Full of her own dreams and her own roads to travel down.

May I and everyone she loves be sometimes seen in her rearview just as there will be ample opportunity to continue traveling with her in the passenger seat.

This is her car to drive now, though.

These are her roads to imagine.

There is a sense of loss here.

The quiet in the house is a clanging gong, a reminder that her work and wishes have brought her somewhere new, somewhere of her choosing.

Yet the loss is fleeting as I flush with pride; she moves on; in the words of Paul Simon, she moves on.

I am both in love with the idea of her flight from the nest; I hate the silence it brings.

I miss her.

I hate that I miss her.

I am so in love with the idea that I miss her.

And so, we dropped her off.

Through a gauzy cloud of mother’s tears and veil of gladness mixed with sadness, we saidc “see you later.”

We never say goodbye, we say “see you later.”

A hug; a memory; the road continues; the horizon approaches, we are changed.

And in the miles between us is love; a tether to the reality that is a heart not untouched by a father’s love for his daughter.

And so after a week away from this place, I return changed.

Changed in a sense and yet the new normal is just that.

It is new and it is normal.

Part of the normal is preaching, a gift to me as it is something I love to do.

On occasion, I am decent at it.

But the first gospel I am to preach about this morning is about hate.

“Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children…”

I just dropped my daughter off at college for the first time and this is the gospel I return to.

Jesus says, “Hey Dad, if you want to follow me and your children don’t hate you, then you’re doing it wrong.”

“Hey daughter, hate your Dad and follow me!”

Am I to hate my children?

Seriously, Jesus?

Am I to hate my wife?

This doesn’t make sense.

Honor thy father and thy mother.

Didn’t your father tell Moses to write that down?

How can I honor my mother and father if I am to hate them?

I don’t know that I can hate those most dear to me.

I cannot hate my family.

I will not hate my family.

In the words of my children’s generation, make this make sense!

So then, let’s try.

Let’s try and make this make sense.

There are things we hate.

Cheating.

Theft.

Violence.

All of those things that bring damage and destruction to others, to innocents and the uncondemned.

We hate those things.

Is that the hate Jesus prescribes for us?

Is that the hate we should have in our hearts if we are to be true followers of Jesus?

But looking closely, Jesus is not saying we should do the hating.

Instead, we should be hated.

Not that that is any better, but okay.

Let me be hated.

Even in his Sermon on the Plain, Jesus says, “Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man.”

So, he’s being consistent here.

We will be hated and reviled and defamed, all because of our faith in Jesus.

That just sounds super-duper, does it not!

I think we have the makings of a new banner outside, “Search for Jesus, find hate!”

And yet, I do not think that will help to grow this congregation or truly share the message of our Savior.

Instead, let us ask why.

Why Jesus, must my parents hate me?

Why Jesus, must my children exclude me?

Why Jesus, must my brother defame me?

Why Jesus, must my wife revile me?

How is this to be a movement worth joining if I am to be hated by those I most love?

What is the point if I am banished from family; ridiculed by friends?

And so, again, let’s try to make this make sense.

What did Peter’s wife think when he dropped everything to join with Jesus?

What did James’ and John’s father, those Sons of Zebedee, those Sons of Thunder, think when his children, his heirs to his fishing business think when they dropped their nets to join Jesus?

Did Peter’s wife just say, “Yeah, go ahead and walk the earth with that Christ fella. I’ve got things covered here.”

Did James’ and John’s father get down on his knees and cry hosannah now that his sons left him to run the business on his own?

When the seas grew angry and the waters became rough did their father think how wonderful it was that his sons had left him now that he was left to raise his nets alone?

Did Peter’s wife struggle to put food on the table and thanked God for such a struggle?

I do not think so.

I think those closest to James and John and Peter probably and perhaps understandably reviled their decisions to leave their responsibilities and I can also imagine they hated, they were truly frustrated with and hated the people they loved because they were gone, and because they were left to struggle.

And they were hated, at least sometimes, because they upended their lives, they tore up the contracts formed in the past and wrote new ones.

They were no longer husbands and sons, but disciples.

And as disciples they were to follow Jesus and heal people and lift up the poor and do all of those things and all of those things took them away from family.

To follow Christ properly, they had to change their lives and loves and headings.

And they were most likely hated for it.

And that is what makes this passage so difficult.

For if we are to be followers of Christ, we are to upend our own lives.

In the words of Amy-Jill Levine:

The nature of discipleship cannot be limited to a single action or even to consistent Sunday church attendance . If one follows after Jesus , then one is to dedicate oneself completely to that new path , or to use Jesus’s term , to go through the narrow gate . Discipleship means complete dedication to the gospel .

This quote is from Levine’s book, “The Difficult Words of Jesus.”

And the words this morning are truly, truly difficult.

Because Jesus is asking us to upend our own lives to follow him.

It would be easier to say that being a good person was enough, giving to charity was enough, giving our Tuesdays to the Lion’s Club was enough.

Those are all great and good things.

Necessary things.

And yet Jesus asks us to devote our very lives to him, to lay down our nets.

If we are to follow Jesus, are we willing to miss out on other things in our efforts to feed the hungry and lift up the poor?

Are we willing to encounter resentment for missing a child’s play because we were visiting the prisoner or dispossessed?

The gate is narrow, we will only find our way to salvation if we give ourselves to Christ.

I both love and hate that my daughter is now 300 miles away.

I both love and hate and, in fact, regret that my years of study and formation took me away from her.

How I hate that I missed choral concerts and cheer competitions.

How I wonder if there is something emanating from her, animosity, teenaged indifference, maybe even hatred that I missed those things to follow Jesus.

Yet just as I know there might be hatred or bad feelings, I too know there is love.

We can love and we can hate and sometimes all at once encompassing the same object.

And beyond hatred, I know Jesus is asking us to follow him.

And by following him we will experience a perfect and unyielding love.

Love, being greater than hate.

Amen.