"Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers, and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.
Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple."
These verses have given me some pause in my journey as a Christian. Not so much verse 27 ("...carry the cross and follow me..."), but the prerequisite of hating family.
"Hate." On the surface, it's just not a comfortable word. It's not nearly as bad as something like "indifference," but, as the saying goes, it's a strong word.
From Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words
A-1 Verb Strong's Number: g3404 Greek: miseo Hate, Hateful, Hater, Hatred:
"to hate," is used especially(c) of relative preference for one thing over another, by way of expressing either aversion from, or disregard for, the claims of one person or thing relatively to those of another, Mat 6:24; and Luk 16:13, as to the impossibility of serving two masters; Luk 14:26, as to the claims of parents relatively to those of Christ; Jhn 12:25, of disregard for one's life relatively to the claims of Christ; Eph 5:29, negatively, of one's flesh, i.e. of one's own, and therefore a man's wife as one with him.
I once heard a pastor preach on how the word "hate" there could also be understood as complete separation or detachment. That definitely helps to ease my issues with the word hate (I'm such a hippie...). But that doesn't help with the fact that detachment--complete separation--carries with it a connotation of disinterest; a complete lack of concern for those left behind.
For a long time, I hadn't pieced together how exactly one does that without also acquiring a seriously guilty conscience (even though one is doing this for the cause of Christ, yes, yes, I know... There are obviously parts of my life I have not surrendered... Bear with me, work in progress, all that...).
That is until today.
Here's my revelation.
To love Christ more than family is to trust not only that God is going to take care of you as you follow Him, but also that God is going to take care of those you leave behind.
This, of course, is all dependent on where God is leading you. Following Christ and caring for family are not mutually exclusive. The problem lies within preferring to tend to your family's needs over what Christ is calling you to do. The source of my problem with this is not trusting my family or God enough to take care of things without me. One of my problems is I'm a control freak. I micromanage, and I didn't want to see that because I dislike that trait in others.
Shame. On. Me.
Thank you, Jesus, for taking on my shame.
Praise God for seeing through the shame and seeing me.
This is why I'm taking Beth Moore's advice and buying a Hebrew Greek Key Word Study Bible. And we should make it a point to talk these things out, because He alone knows how often I resist a piece of scripture because I don't like or frankly understand the wording....rather than taking the time and making the effort to do so.
ReplyDeleteProverbs 31 gave me fits for the longest time. And it literally took hours of prayer and meditation (and a big dose of Mrs. Moore) to get me through it.