Are you a fan or following? Twenty Third Sunday, cycle C

     Who here has every binged watched a TV series? If you are not familiar with the term, it has to do with watching multiple episodes of a TV series in one sitting. My wife and I have been binge watching a series called the Chosen. It’s about the life of Jesus and the call of his disciples to follow Him. The one thing I like about the series is that it really brings to life the character of the disciples and their struggles they had in following Jesus. They try and do their best, and fail many times, but Jesus keeps welcoming them to follow him. If you have not watched the series I’d encourage you to check it out.     

    The are several scenes from the Chosen that remind me of today’s Gospel where Jesus is

surrounded by a large crowd so they can witness Jesus perform miracles.   I would call these crowds fans of Jesus, and not really his disciples. Being a fan is easy and can be an escape from our daily routine. You can go to a show, concert, or game to be in the crowd to cheer on your favorite celebrity, music group, or team and then go home and then get back to your daily routine.   You don’t need to make a change in your life, to be a fan..

Being a true follower, a disciple, is hard as it comes at a cost. It requires a commitment that requires hard work on a daily basis. I think Jesus wanted to challenge the crowds to see if they were ready to accept the call to follow his way as a disciple.

Jesus challenged them with three conditions to be His disciple. The first sounds quite harsh, hating your family and even your own life. In the Hebrew culture of the time the word hate had a different meaning than it does today.  Hate meant to give lesser priority. So Jesus is requiring to put family relationships and even their own lives, behind him. By having a relationship Jesus as first priority our family relationship and lives will be richer.

The second condition is to be willing to suffer for Jesus, by carrying your own cross. How can we do this? By being willing to live as a Christian witness in the world. It may be a doctor, nurse, or other health care worker refusing to participate in procedures related to abortion, sterilization, or assisted suicide, at risk loss of their jobs. It could be standing up for racial justice or non-violence with co-workers during your conversations at lunch, were you might be ridiculed. It may be giving up a Saturday morning once a month to volunteer at a food pantry instead of going to the gym.

If we live as a Christian in the world we will suffer, but we will gain in peace of the hope of eternal life promised by Jesus. The third condition to follow Jesus is to renounce all your possessions. This sounds extremely difficult as we need certain things to live: our home, cars, and money to buy food and medical care.  Do we really need to give all of those up all in order to be a disciple of Jesus? Maybe a few who join religious communities that make a vow of poverty to follow Jesus. May need to do that. But most of us still need some of those possessions in order to live our lives. Jesus is asking us to surrender from those possessions from possessing us, and being satisfied with just enough to sustain our lives.

About twenty years ago I was more of a fan than a follower of Jesus.  I would come to Mass almost every Sunday, but it just one of the activities in my busy life. My top priority was my job so I could make a lot of money to buy all the latest things and engage in experiences for me and my family.

But I had no peace in my life, because I was always striving for more, and I had little time for a relationship with Jesus. A friend from Church invited me to attend a Welcome retreat, but I had little interest as cost me time from my job and family. I reluctantly went on the retreat and it opened me up to listen to the Jesus and to follow as his disciple  After the retreat I made Jesus first priority in my life and found that peace that was lacking. I began a daily relationship with Jesus in prayer and trying to follow his way of being His disciple.    I dedicated time to serving others going on a parish mission trips to Appalachia and serving at Saint Vincent DePaul. I eventually left my job and found one that more compatible with being a disciple of Jesus. This eventually led me to be open to the call to serve in the diaconate. I was no longer just a fan of Jesus, I was dedicated to being a follower as his disciple.

In choosing to be a disciple of Jesus it requires assess the cost of doing so, just like the person who calculated the cost to build the tower in the Gospel in order to finish the job I’ve had to reassess my own life over the years to make sure I’m keeping Jesus first priority in my life  It’s not just a one-time decision to follow Jesus as his disciple. I’ve had to make some adjustments multiple times over the years to keep Jesus first in my life.   

If we want to be more than just a fan of Jesus, we can ask for God’s wisdom in prayer to help in listening of how to keep Jesus as top priority so we can live more intentionally as his disciples.   We might be called to do something new in our lives that may come at a cost.  It might be to volunteer our time in such as serving in ministry as a youth catechist or helping feed the hungry in the food pantry. It may be a call to be more loving to our spouse, to more fully live out our vocation of Christian marriage It may require us to be open to consider a call to the diaconate, priesthood, or serving in a religious community. It may be to have the courage to be a more Christian witness to defending the poor and social justice with those you work or go to school.  All these examples may come at a cost, but will give us a greater sense of peace in having Jesus first priority in living as His disciples.